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"GREAT-HEART 




y i^-^JL-^r-^C^ryJi f^ cr^J-^^e^ny^'-uC" 



^'GREAT HEART" 

The Life Story of 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

By NiEL MacIntyre 

Illustrated with photographs, 
and cartoon by Ding' ' 



William Edwin Rudge 

Publisher 

New York City 



X 






"GREAT-HEART" 

The Life Story of Theodore Roosevelt 

Copyright, 1919, by William Edwin Rudge 

Printed in the United States of America 

Published May, 1919 



NOV -5 1919 



©CI.A536443 



Dedicated to 
The Fighting' Sons 

of 
Theodore 
Roosevelt 



*'It is as though Bunyan's Mr. Greatheart 
had died in the midst of his pilgrimage, 
for he was the greatest proved American 
of his generation. ' ' 



RUDYARD KIPLING 



INTRODUCTION 

In the following pages Niel Maclntyre has 
presented in condensed form the life story of 
Theodore Roosevelt. The writer has made no 
serious effort to go into the details of his official 
and political career or to deal with the great 
questions of foreign and home policy which came 
up during his public career. 

Theodore Roosevelt's activities were so varied 
and the field he covered so wide, that no work 
of this kind can give more than the barest outline. 
Nevertheless, the book is so written as to give 
those who may read it a general idea of his boy- 
hood, his youth, and many of the things he did, 
his high ideals, his purity of purpose, his intense 
patriotism, his love of the outdoor life, and his 
understanding not only of towns and cities, but 
of the wild places of the world and the people, 
animals, and birds who dwell in them. 

The story brings out his intense Americanism, 
his love of fair play, and his fearless and straight- 
forward character. He stands out as a man whose 
life was characterized not only by devotion to 
country and truth, as he saw it, but to the best 
interests of mankind. Wliile his spirit was one 



of intense Americanism, his sympathies were as 
wide as the world. 

It is a book especially fitted for the youth of 
the country, and the record of achievements 
therein will serve as an inspiration to all who 
read it. 

Theodore Roosevelt was the most inspiring 
and, consequently, the most dominant figure in 
our national life since Lincoln, and his influence 
on American youth and upon our people as a 
whole will always be an uplifting one. 

His life will always be an inspiration for 
greater effort and for higher ideals. 

"Great-Heart" is dead but his influence lives on! 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE 

The purpose of the writer has been to show 
why Rudyard Kipling thought Theodore Roose- 
velt the incarnation of Bunyan's character 
"Great-Heart," and to reflect the romance and 
inspiration contained in Roosevelt's life. 

The work has been approached from the view- 
point of one who was not a partisan; of one dis- 
posed to be critical ; of one who, however, viewing 
Roosevelt's career as a whole, was so moved by 
its grandeur that he became impelled to play 
what part he could in perpetuating the memory 
of this inspiring American among his people. 

Moreover, there was a natural attraction to 
write of him whose career from birth to death 
was a panorama of adventure and climax and 
achievement; of him whose life had in it those 
elements which create literature — that human 
stuff that makes immortal such books as Plu- 
tarch's Lives and Robinson Crusoe. 

Full justice to his subject the author could not 
hope to render. Powerful indeed will be the pen 
that adequately describes Roosevelt's life of 
struggle and triumph, with its warfare against 
bodily handicaps and political prejudice; warfare 



against wild beasts in dense jungles; warfare 
against hunger and exhaustion on inconceivably 
hard journeys of exploration; warfare against 
predatory wealth; warfare against men in high 
places who would grind the faces of the poor; 
warfare to prepare America to stamp out forever 
militarism and bloodshed; warfare to lead the 
race to the loftiest goals. 

The writer does not therefore promise that 
every motive and deed of Roosevelt's life will be 
chronicled in this book. He has tried to be faithful 
to the main facts, and to so group these facts that 
the narrative will be vivid and moving — typical 
of the man about whom it is written — so that not 
only the few, but also the many, will find enjoy- 
ment and uplift in the story. The author will be 
content if the average man or woman or boy or 
girl, feels beating through these pages the warm 
pulses of him who was indeed — "Great-Heart." 

NiEL MacIntyre. 



THE CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAOE 

I "A Reg'lar Boy" 1 

II Roosevelt in the Bad Lands 12 

III Broncos and Bears 30 

IV Champion of Women and Children 47 

V Keeping Fit 61 

VI Roosevelt's "Cops" 70 

VII Roosevelt's Influence on American 

Naval Affairs 85 

VIII Roosevelt's Rough Riders 99 

IX Campaigning in Cuba 110 

X The Great Peace-Maker 134 

XI Roosevelt's Political Victories 145 

XII First Years in the Presidency 160 

XIII Good Will Abroad; a Square Deal 

at Home 173 

XIV The "Bull Moose" 187 

XV From ^^^lite House to Jungle 193 

XVI The River of Doubt 208 

XVII Roosevelt's Part in the World War 214 

XVIIl Great-Heart 288 



THE ILLUSTRATIONS 



PAGE 



Theodore Roosevelt's Portrait Frontispiece 

Roosevelt in the Bear Country 16 

Just Before Entering Yellowstone Park 32 

Roosevelt, the Fighter 48 

Roosevelt, the Man 49 

Combination Photograph Showing Roosevelt 
in Characteristic Poses 80 

Roosevelt Addressing an Interested 

Audience 96 

Before the Battle of San Juan 112 

Hall at Sagamore Hill 128 

Family Group Taken While Roosevelt Was 
Governor of New York 144 

Roosevelt's Cabinet in 1908 160 

Roosevelt's Arrival at Gardiner, Mont. 176 

Roosevelt as a Grandfather 192 

Roosevelt's Home, Sagamore Hill 208 

Roosevelt's Service Stars 224 

Roosevelt at Sagamore Hill 228 



'^A Reg'lar Boy" 

IN ROOSEVELT, the statesman, still lived 
"Ted," the boy. To see this fact in all its 
clearness one has only to let his thoughts go 
back to the period when Roosevelt was Presi- 
dent and follow him on a camping expedition 
with his boys and their cousins, come from miles 
aroimd to share in the expedition. 

The beach is reached ; the fishing poles are put 
out; the catch is brought in. Thereupon Roose- 
velt himself turns cook. It is a big job, for there 
are many boys and their appetites are keen ; but 
the cook is equal to the task. Then night steals 
on them. The campfire grows to enormous pro- 
portions. Around it the boys sit, listening with 
breathless interest to the wonder tales of hunt- 
ing and cow-punching that come from the Presi- 
dent who for his boys' sake has made himself a 
lad again. 

As we recall this scene we remember that the 
sons of Roosevelt fought for righteousness 
in France. We recall, too, that campfires 
and roughly cooked food were the order of the 
day in the paths these and millions of other boys 
traveled, and we wonder if, as they bivouacked, 

TB2 [ 1 ] 



2 ] GREAT-HEART 



there did not come to them the memory^ of those 
nights when as boys their father led them out on 
a hard trail and then, in night-wrapped woods, 
stood guard over them as they rolled themselves 
in their blankets and fell into that sound sleep 
which had no room for the terrible dreams war 
engenders. 

It is when such pictures present themselves to 
our minds that we say to ourselves that Bayard 
Taj'lor wrote facts as well as poetry when he 
said: 

"The bravest are the tenderest, 
The loving are the daring!" 

If a person who knew nothing of Roosevelt's 
antecedents were asked to express an opinion as 
to the type of boy he was, that person, reasoning 
from Roosevelt's great vigor and the intensity 
with which he threw himself into outdoor pursuits, 
would say that he was a strong, healthy lad. 

The reverse, however, is the case. From earliest 
infancy Theodore Roosevelt had been subject to 
attacks of asthma that weakened him physically 
and hindered his growth. He confesses that as a 
little fellow he was timid, and that when larger 
boys strove to exercise over him that domination 
which the boy of an older age thinks himself 



GREAT-HEART [ 3 



privileged to exercise over a younger lad, he was 
backward in opposing them. It was his physical 
weakness that prevented him from going to 
school and that led him to be placed under the 
instruction of various tutors. 

"Bill" Sewall, the old woodsman and hunter, 
who figures in several of Roosevelt's books, and 
who, for over forty years had been a close friend 
of Roosevelt, said after the Colonel's death: 

"No, Theodore's death did not surprise me. 
Men thought that he was strong and robust. He 
wasn't. It was his boundless energy, his deter- 
mination and his nerves that kept Theodore 
Roosevelt turning out the enormous quantities 
of work he did. Really, he suffered from heart 
disease all his life." 

There dwelt in the boy Roosevelt an indomit- 
able will. He also possessed a love for sports, 
travel and adventure such as could only be en- 
joyed with a strong body. Into his ken came the 
heroes of Captain Mayne Reid's novels and also 
the heroes of Fenimore Cooper's "Leatherstock- 
ing Tales." He wanted to be like these men. 
Young as he was, he was keen enough to realize 
that to enter upon the career of which he dreamed 
he must have a sound constitution and overflow- 
ing energy. His will assumed control of his 



4 ] GREAT-HEART 



feeble body. His mind spurred his heart, Hmbs 
and lungs. He determined that the next bullying 
lad would have to contend with a boy with 
stronger muscles and heavier frame. Even as he 
resolved the springs of bodily vigor became loosed 
in the young boy. The town house became too 
small to hold him. Jacob Riis relates that a 
woman who lived next door to the Roosevelts 
told him that one day she saw young Theodore 
hanging out of a second-story window, and ran 
in a desperate hurry to tell his mother. What 
Ted's mother said as she hurried off to rescue her 
son made a lasting impression on this woman: 
"If the Lord had not taken care of Theodore he 
would have been killed long ago." 

In addition to the streets of New York beau- 
tiful Long Island was his for roving, for here 
his family spent the summer. He ran races with 
his chums; stole rides on his father's mounts; 
swam, rowed and sailed on Long Island Sound. 
He explored the hills, caves and woods of his 
country home. He had sisters, and, of course, 
his sisters had girl companions, and of course he 
had his special friend among this group of girl 
playmates. Naturally, his Southern mother made 
it her rule to promote chivalry in her son, and 
so Ted played the gallant on many a picnic or 



GREAT- HEART [ 5 



horseback ride. Soon his parents saw what the 
doctors had failed to do the great outdoors was 
doing. Strong muscles came to him. He lost the 
fatigue which accompanied his first exertions. 
His young frame broadened and grew stout 
enough to stand the rigors of outdoor life. Na- 
ture had had little chance with him when he was 
shut up in New York among his books, but now 
that he had come to her she gave him the rich 
blood and the strong nerves which later furnished 
him the strength to attain the fulfilment of his 
ambitious plans. 

Ted was a sheer boy in these days, and a sheer 
boy he remained until he went to college. Con- 
cerning him an old Long Island stage-driver, in 
whose stage Ted often rode, remarked to Henry 
Beech Needham: *'He was a reg'lar boy. Al- 
ways outdoors, climbin' trees and goin' bird- 
nestin'! I remember him particular, because he 
had queer things alive in his pockets. Sometimes 
it was even a snake!" 

Roosevelt met "Bill" Sewall for the first time 
when he was eighteen years old. This was when 
he first came to Sewall's hunting-camp in Maine, 
which is still in existence. 

"Be very careful with him," Arthur Cutler, 
his tutor, warned Sewall. "Don't take him on 



6 ] GREAT- HEART 



such tramps as you take yourself. He couldn't 
stand it. But he wouldn't let you know that for 
a minute. He'd go till he dropped rather than 
admit it. He isn't strong, though. You must 
watch him carefully." 

TOOK A LOT OF WATCHING 

"I did watch him carefully," said "Bill" 
Sewall. "He took a lot of watching," he added. 
"Yes, a lot of watching. He'd never quit. I 
remember the time we set out from my place 
up at Island Falls to climb Mount Katadin. 
That's the tallest mountain we have in Maine. 
We were crossing Wissacataquoik Creek. The 
current is very swift there. Somehow Theodore 
lost one of his shoes. Away it went downstream. 
All he had with him to take the place of shoes 
was a pair of thin-skinned moccasins. The stones 
and crags on the way up cut his feet into tatters. 
But he kept on, with never a murmur of com- 
plaint. That's a little thing, perhaps ; but he was 
that way in all things — always." 

Later, when Roosevelt had lost his first wife 
and also his mother, it was to Sewall, the back- 
woodsman who, in long walks in the Maine for- 
ests, had given him his first lessons in the value 
of unvarnished democracy, that he turned for 



GREAT- HEART [ 7 



solace, and it was this Maine guide who went 
AVest with him and helped to lead him out of the 
daze that followed these bereavements. 

Roosevelt's interest in boxing developed when 
he was fourteen, and rose out of the primitive 
need of being able to protect himself against boys 
who sought to impose on him. At that time he 
ventured forth by himself on a trip to Moosehead 
Lake and on the stage-coach that bore him there 
he met two mischievous boys of his own age who 
proceeded to make life miserable for him. Made 
desperate by their persecutions, he decided to lick 
them, but found that either one singly was more 
than a match for him. 

Bitterly determined that he should not be again 
humiliated in this way, he resolved to learn how 
to defend himself, and, with his father's ap- 
proval, started to learn boxing. 

Mr. Roosevelt himself relates how, under the 
training of John Long, an ex-prize-fighter, whose 
rooms were ornamented with vivid pictures of 
ring champions and battles, he first put on the 
gloves. For a long period he was knocked around 
the ring with no other fighting quality in evidence 
but the ability to take pimishment. But then, 
when his boxing master arranged a series of 
matches, he was entered in a lightweight contest 



8 ] GREAT- HEART 



and entrusted to the care of his guardian angel. 
Luckily his opponents chanced to be two 
youths whose ambitions greatly exceeded their 
science and muscular development, and, to the 
surprise of all concerned, he emerged the pos- 
sessor of the prize cup for his class — a pewter 
mug that, though it would have been dear at fifty 
cents, was nevertheless a rich compensation for 
the knockdowns and bruises he had endured dur- 
ing his training. 

ROOSEVELT AT COLLEGE 

In his account of Roosevelt as an outdoor man 
Henry Beech Needham furnishes this interesting 
picture of Theodore in his college days : 

"It was a bout to decide the lightweight cham- 
pionship of Harvard. The heavyweight and mid- 
dleweight championships had been awarded. 
The contest for the men under 140 pounds was 
on. Roosevelt, then a junior, had defeated seven 
men. A senior had as many victories to his credit. 
They were pitted against each other in the finals. 
The senior was quite a bit taller than 
Roosevelt and his reach was longer. He also 
weighed more by six pounds, but Roosevelt was 
the quicker man on his feet and knew more of the 
science of boxing. The first round was vigorously 



GREAT-HEART [ 9 



contested. Roosevelt closed in at the very outset. 
Because of his bad eyes he realized that infighting 
gave him his only chance to win. Blows were ex- 
changed with lightning rapidity, and they were 
hard blows. Roosevelt drew first blood, but soon 
his own nose was bleeding. At the call of time, 
however, he got the decision for the round. 

"The senior had learned his lesson. Ther^fter 
he would not permit Roosevelt to close in on him. 
With his longer reach, and aided by his antago- 
nist's near-sightedness, he succeeded in landing 
frequent blows. Roosevelt worked hard, but to 
no avail. The round was awarded to the senior. 
In the third round the senior endeavored to pur- 
sue the same tactics, but with less success. The 
result of this round was a draw, and an extra 
round had to be sparred. Here superior weight 
and longer reach began to tell, but Roosevelt 
boxed gamely to the end. Said his antagonist: 
*I can see him now as he came in fiercely to the 
attack. But I kept him off, taking no chances, 
and landing at long reach. I got the decision, but 
Roosevelt was far more scientific. Given good 
eyes, he would have defeated me easily.' " 

In the simmier of 1883 Roosevelt, struggling 
through a more than usually serious attack of 
asthma, "went West," in the hope that outdoor 



10 ] GREAT-HEART 



life in Dakota would restore him to strength. 

Medora, the place to which fortune directed 
him, was a little prairie settlement barely inhab- 
ited except on pay day, when the cowboys 
galloped in from the surrounding ranches to 
spend their well-earned money in the saloons. 

Roosevelt had selected Medora as a possible 
haunt of buffalo-hunters, and he inquired eagerly 
of the inhabitants as to how he could find a guide 
for a bison-hunt. 

One of the owners of the Chimney Butte 
Ranch, Joe Ferris, chanced to be in town that 
day, and while his companions were eyeing the 
spectacled "tenderfoot" with amusement or sus- 
picion, Ferris, attracted by the newcomer's 
friendly and honest looks, invited him to his ranch. 

Roosevelt gladly accepted this opportunity to 
know ranch life at first hand. After a drive of 
twelve miles, Ferris led him up to a crude ranch- 
house. "When Roosevelt entered its door he found 
its furniture quite as primitive as was the building. 

The place was owned by Joe Ferris and his 
brother, Sylvane, who were in partnership with 
one Joe Merrifield. The young Easterner han- 
dled himself in a way that won the esteem of 
these hardy, keen-eyed "cow-punchers." They 
took him on a trying trip through the desolate 



GREAT- HEART [11 



"Bad Lands" in search of bison, but Roosevelt 
endured the hardships without flinching and in 
the end got what he went after — a bull buffalo. 

^Vhen the trip was over Roosevelt found him- 
self in love not only with his comrades, but also 
with their cattle and ponies and crude outfit. He 
bought the ranch ; left Merrifield in charge as his 
foreman; and came East to enter upon another 
vigorous term in the Legislature. 

Two years later, Roosevelt found himself sick 
of politics, and at odds with life itself. His 
adored mother had died, and, a few hours after 
her passing, his wife had also died in giving birth 
to his daughter Alice. Leaving the child in the 
best of care in New York, he went back to 
Dakota, resolved to devote himself to ranching. 

He selected a site for his new ranch house at 
Elkhorn, and his favorite companions, Sewall 
and Wilmot Dow, Sewall's nephew, who came 
West to join him, had a great deal to do with the 
building of this house. 

Sewall states that Roosevelt at the time in- 
tended to take up cattle-raising as a permanent 
business, having heard that there was "money 
in it." 



II 
Roosevelt in the Bad Lands 

<?<? TJELL-ROARING BILL JONES," a citi- 
XJL zen of the forlorn little cattle town of 
Medora, possessed four distinctions: He was 
sheriff of the county, he was a gun-fighter, he 
was a handy man with his fists, and he became 
a friend of Theodore Roosevelt, who had now 
acquired the two cattle ranches, the Chimney 
Butte and the Elkhorn. 

There was an election in town. A fight was 
threatened. Roosevelt, fresh from his own po- 
litical battles in the New York Assembly, 
heard out on his ranch that one of the parties 
would import section hands from nearby rail- 
road stations to throw their weight into the con- 
flict. Instantly the place of election became the 
only spot in the world for him. 

The news had been late in reaching him, and 
when he rode into Medora the election was well 
under way. Roosevelt inquired if there had been 
any disorder. 

"Disorder, hell!" said a bystander. "Bill 
Jones just stood there with one hand on his 
gun and with the other pointing over toward the 
new jail whenever any man who didn't have the 

[12] 



GREAT-HEART [ 13 



right to vote came near the polls. The only one 
of them who tried to vote Bill knocked down! 
Lord! the way that man fell!" 

"Well!" Bin ejaculated, "if he hadn't fell I'd 
have walked around behind him to see what was 
propping him up!" 

It was with men like these, in surroundings 
like these, that young Roosevelt had elected to 
learn to the full extent the lesson of democracy. 

Before his Western trip Roosevelt had al- 
ready had his manhood and his spirit of brother- 
hood tested in the hard-waged battles of New 
York political life. Now was to come a test in- 
finitely greater. The former member of the 
New York Assembly, the man who had oc- 
cupied a high place in New York social life, 
who in his earlier days was noted for his well- 
tailored figure and his eyeglasses, had turned 
his back on all this. He told his folks that he 
was going West to "rough it" and to mix with 
mankind, and both of these he did to the utmost. 

LIFE ON THE RANCH 

The place he chose for his home ranch was 
one of the worst of the undeveloped sections of 
the country. The ranch lay on both sides of the 
Little Missouri River. In front of the ranch 



14 ] GREAT-HEART 



house itself was a long veranda, and in front of 
that a line of cottonwood trees that shaded it. 
The bluffs rose from the river valley; stables, 
sheds and other buildings were near. A circu- 
lar horse corral lay not far from the house. In 
winter wolves and lynxes traveled up the river 
on the ice, directly in front of the ranch house. 

Life at the ranch house was of the most primi- 
tive nature. Though they had a couple of cows 
and some chickens, which supplied them with 
milk and eggs, they lived for the most part on 
canned fare. 

At the roundups and during his long rides 
over the range, and on many hunting trips, 
Roosevelt had his favorite horse as companion — 
Manitou. This horse was so fond of him that 
it used to come up of its own accord to the ranch 
house and put its head into the door to beg for 
bread and sugar. 

When it was not a question of roundup or 
herding cattle, or driving them to new grazing 
lands, the men at the ranch house broke in 
horses, mended their saddles and practised with 
the rope. Hunting trips broke into regular 
ranch life. The primitive little sitting-room of 
the Elkhorn Ranch was adorned with buffalo 
robes and bearskins of Roosevelt's own killing; 



\^ 



GREAT- HEART [15 



and in winter there was always to be found good 
reading and a cheery fire. 

A MAN AMONG MEN 

Roosevelt brushed elbows in Medora with 
newly arrived hunters from the plains and 
mountains, clad in buckskin shirts and fur caps — 
greasy and unkempt, yet strong and resolute 
men. Then there were teamsters, in slouch hats 
and great cowhide boots ; stage-drivers with faces 
like leather; Indians wrapped in blankets; cow- 
boys galloping through the streets. These men 
had all come to town to obtain relief from the 
monotony of their occupations or from long per- 
iods of peril and hardship, and the only enter- 
tainment that awaited them were "flaunting sa- 
loons and gawdy hells of all kinds," to borrow 
Roosevelt's own description. Among them 
moved the "bad men," professional thieves and 
man-killers, who owed their lives to their ability 
to draw their weapons before other men could 
draw theirs. 

Roosevelt was deeply interested in these im- 
usual characters and scenes. Indeed, it was to 
drink in this frank, self-reliant spirit that he 
had come West. He met these men on their own 
groxmd, fearlessly. They saw that, in spite of 



16 ] GREAT-HEART 



his eyeglasses, he was a man after their own 
kind. Often he found himself in places of dan- 
ger and saw men killed beside him in drunken 
brawls, yet there was something about him that 
made bad men pause before they challenged 
him. 

Among Roosevelt's cowboys was a Pueblo 
Indian who was a bad lot, a Sioux who was faith- 
ful and a mulatto who was one of his best men. 
The men would carry the "brand" of their ranch 
even in their own nicknames. Thus it would 
be said that "Bar Y" Harry had married the 
"Seven Open A" girl. 

It was when he was thrown into contact day 
after day with the men of his own ranch that 
the most severe test of Roosevelt as a "good fel- 
low" came. 

He came through his initiation into ranch life 
the idol of his men, though they never got to the 
stage where they would neglect a chance to poke 
sly fun at him. He relates how once, when on a 
wood-chopping expedition, he overheard some- 
one ask Dow, a ranchman bred in the Maine 
woods, what the total cut had been. Dow, un- 
conscious that he was within hearing, said: 

"Well, Bill cut down fifty-three, I cut forty- 
nine and the boss he beavered seventeen." 



^<'ei^«£!>jLViC'«R, 












ROOSEVELT IN THE BEAR COUNTRY 



GREAT-HEART [17 



The force of the jest, Roosevelt explains, lies 
aot in the small number of trees his ax felled, 
but in the comparison of his chopping with the 
gnawing of the beaver. 

At another time Roosevelt, struggling des- 
perately to mount an unwilling horse, heard be- 
hind him a cowboy remark to the effect that he 
would find it hard to qualify for the job of 
"bronco buster." 

Roosevelt enjoyed these jokes as much as 
those who made them. The West was a bad 
place for a coward or a shirker, and the man who 
permitted himself to be bullied and made a butt 
was in for an uncomfortable existence. On the 
other hand, the man who did his work and gave 
and took jests in the spirit in which they were 
intended quickly made lasting friends. 

One of the stories "Bill" Sewall tells of Roose- 
velt's ranch life is this: 

"Once on the cattle ranch in North Dakota 
during a roundup, his horse reared, threw him 
and then fell on top of him. The spill broke 
Theodore's shoulder-blade. But he was afraid the 
cowpunchers might think he was a quitter. So 
he stayed out on the roundup for three days, 
suffering the intensest pain all the while, but 
never saying a word about it to anyone." 

TR3 



18 ] GREAT- HEART 



The men usually carried revolvers, and now 
and then an ill temper or an excess of drinking 
led to a shooting affray. Roosevelt was witness; 
to or had first-hand knowledge of several of 
these. In his book "Ranch Life and the Hunting 
Trail" he tells how a desperado, a man from 
Arkansas, had a quarrel with two Irish despera- 
does who were partners. For several days the 
three lurked about the streets of the town, each 
trying to get the drop on the other. Finally one 
of the Irishmen crept up behind the Arkansan 
as he was walking into a gambling hall and shot 
him in the back. Mortally wounded, the mani 
fell; yet, with the daimtless spirit found in soi 
many of this class, he twisted around as he 
dropped and shot his slayer dead. Knowing that 
he had but a few minutes more to live and ex- 
pecting that his other foe would run up on hear- ■ 
ing the shooting, he dragged himself on his arms i 
out into the street and waited. The second part- 
ner came up at once, to be slain instantly by ai 
bullet from the revolver of the wounded man., 
The victor of this gruesome combat lived just; 
twenty minutes after his victory. 

On another occasion, Welshy, a saloon-keeper, , 
and a man named Hay had been at odds for 
some time. One day Hay entered Welshy's; 



GKE AT- HEART [19 



saloon out of temper and became very abusive. 
Suddenly Wei shy took out his revolver and 
fired at Ha5^ The saloon-keeper almost fainted 
with surprise when Hay, after staggering slight- 
ly, shook himself, stretched out his hand and gave 
back to his would-be slayer the ball. It had 
glanced along his breast-bone, gone into the 
body and come out at the point of the shoulder, 
then dropped down the sleeve into his hand. 
Roosevelt thought the story worthy of the pen 
of a Wister or a Bret Harte, but the editor of 
"The Bad Lands Cowboy" mentioned the event 
merely as an "unfortunate occurrence between 
two of our most esteemed fellow citizens." 

On still another occasion a Scotchman and a 
Minnesota man, both with "shooting" records, 
had a furious quarrel, and later the Scotchman 
mounted his horse, with rifle in hand, and rode 
to the door of the American's mud ranch, breath- 
ing threats of slaughter. The latter, however, 
was not caught napping. From behind a corner 
of his building he instantly shot down his fool- 
ish assailant. 

Soon afterward there was a cowboy ball held 
in the place. Whether or not this was in celebra- 
tion of the victory is not stated, but a historic 
fact in connection with the ball is that Roose- 



20 ] GREAT- HEART 



velt was selected to open the dancing with the 
vnfe of the victor of the shooting affair. The 
husband himself danced opposite, instructing 
Roosevelt in the steps of the lanciers. 

Sometimes Roosevelt found himself involved 
in situations that required both a cool head and 
a sense of humor. When he entered a strange place 
it always took him a day or two to live down the 
fact that he wore spectacles, and he found it a 
justifiable policy to ignore remarks about "four- 
eyes" until it became apparent to him that his 
keeping still was being mistaken for cowardice, 
on which occasion he went at the aggressor ham- 
mer and tongs. 

An amusing happening in which he was a 
central figure occurred when he was out on a 
search for a lost horse. He stopped for the night 
at a little cow town, but was informed by the 
owner of the only hotel that the only accomoda- 
tion left was a room containing two double beds, 
and that three men were already occupying 
these beds. Roosevelt accepted the offer of the 
vacant half bed and turned in. 

Two hours later a lantern flashed in his face 
and he awoke to find himself staring into the 
muzzle of a revolver. Two men bent over him. 
"It ain't him!" said one, and the next moment 



GREAT- HEART [21 



his bedfellow was covered by their guns, and one 
of them said, persuasively: "Now, Bill, don't 
make a fuss, but come along quiet." 

"I'm not thinking of making a fuss," said Bill. 

"That's right," was the answer, "we don't 
want to hurt you; we just want you to come 
along. You know why." 

Bill dressed himself and went with them. "I 
wonder why they took Bill?" Roosevelt asked 
naively. 

"Well," drawled one of his neighbors, "I 
guess they wanted him." 

Roosevelt heard later that Bill had held up 
a North Pacific train and by shooting at the 
conductor's feet, made him dance. Bill was more 
a joker than a train robber, but the holding up 
of the train had delayed the mails, and the 
United States Marshal had sent for him. 

ROOSEVELT MEETS BAD INDIANS 

A peril Roosevelt faced arose from his prox- 
imity to bad Indians. In roaming through the 
uninhabited country surrounding his ranch there 
was constant danger of meeting bands of young 
bucks. These redskins were generallj'- insolent 
and reckless, and if they met a white man when 
the chances of their detection and punishment 



22 ] GREAT- HEART 



were slight they would take away his horse and 
rifle, if not his life. 

One morning Roosevelt had set out on a soli- 
tary trip to the country beyond his ranch. He 
was near the middle of a plateau when a small 
band of Indians suddenly rode over the edge in 
front of him. The minute they saw him, out 
came their guns. Full tilt they dashed at him, 
whooping and brandishing their weapons in typ- 
ical Indian style. Roosevelt reined up and dis- 
mounted. His horse, Manitou, stood steady as 
a rock.- When the Indians were a hundred yards 
off, Roosevelt threw his rifle over Manitou's back 
and drew a bead on the foremost redskin. In- 
stantly the party scattered, doubled back on 
their tracks and bent over alongside their horses 
to shield themselves from Roosevelt's gun. Out 
of rifle range, they held a consultation, and then 
one came forward alone, dropping his rifle and 
waving a blanket over his head. When he was 
within fifty yards he yelled out: "How! Me 
good Indian." Roosevelt returned the "How," 
and assured him that he was delighted to know 
that he was a good Indian, but that he would not 
be permitted to come closer. The other Indians 
came closer, but Roosevelt's rifle covered them. 
After an outburst of profanity, they galloped 



GREAT-HEART [ 23 



away in an opposite direction from Roosevelt's 
route. Later in the day Roosevelt met two trap- 
pers, who told him that his assailants were young 
Sioux bucks, who had robbed them of two horses. 

In his account of this episode, Roosevelt takes 
care to point out that there is another side to the 
Indian character, as indeed all America has 
found out since the gallantry of our Indian 
brothers in the world war. He illustrates this by 
telling how, while spending the night in a small 
cow ranch on the Beaver, he lay in his bunk lis- 
tening to the conversation of two cowboys. They 
were speaking of Indians, and mentioned a jury 
that had acquitted a horse-thief of the charge 
of stealing stock from a neighboring tribe, 
though the thief himself had openly admitted its 
truth. One of these cowboys suddenly remarked 
that he had once met an Indian who was a pretty 
good fellow, and he proceeded to tell the story. 

A small party of Indians had passed the win- 
ter near the ranch at which he was employed. 
The chief had two particularly fine horses. These 
so excited the cowboy's cupidity that one night 
he drove them off and hid them in a safe place. 
The chief looked for them high and low, but 
without success. Soon afterward one of the cow- 
boy's own horses strayed. When spring came 



24 ] GREAT-HEART 



the Indians went away, but three days after- 
ward the chief returned, bringing with him the 
strayed horse, which he had happened to run 
across. "I couldn't stand that," said the narrator, 
"so I just told him I reckoned I knew where his 
own lost horses were, and I saddled up my bron- 
co and piloted him to them." 

Still another story is cited by Roosevelt in de- 
nial of the saying, "The only good Indian is a 
dead Indian." Once, on visiting a neighboring 
ranch, he found waiting there three well-behaved 
and self-respecting Sioux. The woman on the 
ranch told him that a white man had come along 
and tried to run off with their horses. Running 
out, they had caught him, retaken their horses, 
deprived him of his guns and released him. 

"I don't see why they let him go," exclaimed 
Roosevelt's hostess. "I don't believe in stealing 
Indians' horses any more than white folks' so I 
told them they could go along and hang him — 
I'd never cheep." 

When, many years later, Roosevelt became 
President, his knowledge of the condition of the 
Indians led him to become their stanch cham- 
pion. There was then an enormous amount of 
fraud practised by white men in obtaining pos- 
session of Indian lands. Roosevelt used his ex- 



(JUKAT-IIEAKT [ 25 



ecutive power to protect Indian rights and ap- 
pointed as Indian Commissioner Francis E. 
Leupp, one of the best friends the Indians ever 
had. 

POLICE WORK ON THE PLAINS 

There was much horse-stealing and cattle-kill- 
ing in this part of the country while Roosevelt 
was a resident of it. Under the direction of the 
big cattle-owners, vigilantes were organized to 
rid the territory of the "rustlers" — the cowboys' 
name for horse and cattle-thieves. 

Roosevelt admitted the need of these strin- 
gent methods, but his own way of fighting law- 
lessness was to accept the office of deputy sheriff 
for his locality. 

It was while filling this office that Roose- 
velt first made the acquaintance of Seth Bullock, 
who later became one of his warmest friends and 
greatest admirers, and who served as marshal of 
South Dakota under Roosevelt when the latter 
became President. 

Roosevelt first met Seth when the latter was 
sheriff in the Black Hills district. A horse-thief 
Seth wanted escaped into Roosevelt's territory 
and was captured by him, a matter that led Seth 
to give some attention to the young cub of a 



26 ] GREAT-HEART 



deputy two or three hundred miles north of him. 

Later, Bill Jones, Ferris and Roosevelt went 
down to Dead wood on business. At the little town 
of Spearfish they met Seth. The trip had been a 
hard one, and the three travelers were dusty 
and unkempt. Seth's reception of them at first 
was decidedly stand-offish, but when their iden- 
tity became known he unbent. "You see," he 
explained to the future President, "by your 
looks I thought you were some kind of a tin- 
horn gambling outfit, and that I might have to 
keep an eye on you!" 

Roosevelt's reputation as an upholder of the 
law was further enhanced by his arrest of the 
three desperadoes from whom his neighborhood 
had suffered. The vigilantes had almost cleared 
the country of scoundrels, but there remained 
three men who had long been suspected of cattle- 
killing and horse-stealing. One was a half-breed, 
another was an old German of the shiftless type, 
while the leader was a strapping fellow named 
Finnigan, with a crop of red hair reaching to his 
shoulders. These men, finding the neighbor- 
hood becoming too hot for them, were anxious to 
quit that section of the country. Roosevelt pos- 
sessed a clinker-built boat that had been used 
to ferry his men across the river. 



GREAT-HEART [ 27 



One day one of the men brought back to the 
house news that the boat had been stolen. The 
end of the rope had been cut off with a sharp 
knife. Near the stream lay a red woolen mitten 
with a leather palm. These three desperadoes 
were at once suspected. Undoubtedly they knew 
that to travel on horseback in the direction they 
wanted to go was almost impossible and that the 
river offered them the best avenue of escape. 
They must also have reasoned that by taking 
Roosevelt's boat they would possess the only one 
on the river and that, therefore, they could not 
be pursued. 

They reckoned without Roosevelt's fighting 
spirit, however. With the aid of two of his cow- 
boys, Sewall and Dow, who, coming from Maine 
woods, were therefore skilled in woodcraft and in 
the use of the ax, paddle and rifle, they turned 
out in two or three days a first-class flat-bot- 
tomed scow. This was loaded with supplies, and 
early one morning Roosevelt, Sewall and Dow 
started down the river in chase of the thieves. On 
the third day of their pursuit, as they came 
around a bend, they saw the lost boat moored 
against a bank. Some yards from the shore a 
campfire smoke arose. The pursuers shoved their 
scow into the bank and approached the camp. 



28 ] GREAT- HEART 



They found the German sitting by the camp fire 
with his weapons on the ground. His two compan- 
ions were off hunting. When the two thieves 
returned they walked into three cocked rifles, 
Roosevelt shouted to them to hold up their hand^ 
The half-breed obeyed at once. Finnigan hesi- 
tated, but as Roosevelt walked a few paces 
toward him, covering his chest with his rifle, the 
man, with an oath, let his own rifle drop and 
threw his hands high above his head. 

Then came the hardest and most irksome part 
of the task — getting the prisoners safely to jail. 
After many monotonous days and nights, in 
which it was necessary to keep a close guard on 
the prisoners and at the same time navigate the 
river, they came to a cow camp. There Roosevelt 
learned that at a ranch fifteen miles off he could 
hire a large prairie schooner and two tough bron- 
cos for the transportation of his prisoners to 
Dickinson, the nearest town. This was done. Se- 
wall and Dow went back to the boats. Roosevelt 
put the prisoners in the wagon along with an old 
settler, v/ho drove the horses while he walked be- 
hind, ankle-deep in mud, with his Winchester 
over his shoulder. After thirty-six hours of 
sleeplessness the wagon jolted into the main 
street of Dickinson, where Roosevelt delivered 



GREAT- HEART [29 



his prisoners into the hands of the sheriff, and 
received, under the laws of Dakota, his fees as a 
deputy sheriff, amounting to some fifty dollars. 



Ill 
Broncos and Bears 

HUNTING lost broncos was one of the 
commonest and most irksome of Roose- 
velt's ranch duties. On one occasion, when three 
horses under his charge had been running lose 
for a couple of months and had become as wild 
as deer through their stolen liberty, he had to 
follow at full speed for fifteen miles, until by 
exhausting them, he was able to get them under 
control and headed toward a corral. 

At other times he and his men were not so 
lucky. Two horses had been missing from the 
ranch for nearly eighteen months. They were 
seen by his men and pursued but the horses of 
the pursuers became exhausted and broken be- 
fore they caught up with the runaways. 

On another occasion a horse that had been on 
the Roosevelt ranch nine months developed a 
case of homesickness, went off one night and 
traveled two hundred miles back to its former 
roaming grounds, swimming the Yellowstone to 
achieve its goal. 

When Roosevelt was attending one of the re- 
cent national political conventions, up came 
George Meyer, one of his former ranchmen, with 

[30] 



GREAT-HEART [ 81 



this tale of Roosevelt's roundup days on the 
Little Missouri: 

"When the Colonel gets into a mix-up like he 
is in at this convention the picture comes to me 
of the time when he and I started to get two 
calves across the river. I singled out the meekest 
looking, grabbed it up in my arms, held it while 
I managed to get on my horse, and started to 
cross the river. Half way across I turned to see 
how 'the boss' was getting along. 

"He had roped his calf and was dragging it 
toward the river. The calf, bleating and bounc- 
ing, swung round under the horse's tail. This 
set the bronco on a rampage. The river bank 
was high, but over it he bucked. I saw 'the boss' 
clutching the reins with one hand and the calf 
rope with the other. The sudden tautness of the 
rope as the horse plunged into the water hurled 
the calf into the air, landing him beside 'the boss.' 
Through the water the horse plunged, and back 
of bronco and rider floundered the calf. It ar- 
rived on the other shore half strangled and half 
drowned, but it was still bleating and bouncing 
as 'the boss' hauled it to the pen." 



32 ] GREAT-HEART 



THE BRONCO BUSTER 

One of the most interesting tasks of the day 
was the breaking in of a new horse. The profes- 
sional bronco-buster who did this was always an 
object of admiration to the strenuous Roose- 
velt. Roosevelt expressed his respect for these 
men in unreserved terms. He described their 
calling as a most dangerous trade, at which no 
man can hope to grow old. His work was infin- 
itely harder than that of the horse-breaker in the 
East, because he had to break many horses in a 
limited time. Horses were cheap on the plains, j 
Each outfit had a great many, and the pay for 
breaking the animals was only $5 or $10. , 

Giving a keener edge to the work of dealing \ 
with broncos is the peril that confronts the ranch- 
men from vicious horses. One of Roosevelt's 
horses would at times rush at a man open- 
mouthed like a wolf, ready to bury his teeth in 
the rancliman's flesh if he was not quick enough 
to fight him. 

Once in a while a wild stallion was caught. 
This sort of animal fears no beast except the 
grizzly; yet, Roosevelt stated, he has one master 
among animals. That creature is the jackass. A 
battle between jack and stallions came under 




jrST BEFORE ENTERING YELLOWSTONE PARK. JOHN BURROUGHS, 

THE VETERAN NATURALIST, IS AT THE PRESIDENT'S 

RIGHT. SECRETARY LOEB AT HIS LEFT 



GREAT- HEART [ 33 



Roosevelt's observation. Among the animals of 
a certain ranch were two great stallions and a 
jackass. The latter was scarcely half the size of 
the stallions. The animals were kept in separate 
pens, but one day the horses came together, and 
a fight between them ensued. They rolled against 
the pen of the jackass, breaking it down. In- 
stantly the jackass with ears laid back and mouth 
wide open, sprang at the two horses. The gray 
horse reared on his hind legs and struck at his 
antagonist with his fore feet, but in a second the 
jack had grasped the gray by the throat. 

The stallion made frantic endeavors to drive 
him off, but the jack kept his hold. The black 
stallion now plunged into the scrimmage, attack- 
ing both the gray and the jack alternately, using 
hoofs and teeth in his efforts to kill one or the 
other. The jack responded to the new attack 
with increased ferocity, and would doubtless 
have killed at least one of the stallions had not 
the ranchmen, by desperate efforts, separated 
the maddened brutes. 

Roosevelt, on his first roundup, had enough 
experiences with wild broncos to satisfy the most 
hardened rough rider. It was impossible to 
bridle or saddle single-handed one of his horses. 
Another was one of the worst buckers on the 

TR4 



34 ] GREAT-HEART 



ranch. Once it bucked Roosevelt off, resulting in 
a fall that broke a rib. Another would balk and 
then throw himself over backward. Roosevelt 
was once caught under him, and suffered as a 
result a broken shoulder. 

Roosevelt welcomed roundup work as a re- 
lief to the monotony of the daily tasks on the 
ranch. The spring roundup was the big event 
of the season. The bulk of calves were to be 
branded then. Out-of-the-way parts of the coun- 
try where cattle were supposed to have wan- 
dered had to be searched, so that the roundup 
usually extended for six or seven weeks, with no 
rest for the herders. 

First the captain of the roundup was chosen. 
His qualifications were an ability to command 
and control the wild rough riders who served un- 
der him. The rendezvous was set, and from each 
ranch a cowboy rode out to meet at this common 
starting place. A four-horse wagon carried the 
bedding and food. The teamster acted as cook 
and was first-rate at both jobs. A dozen cow- 
punchers accompanied the wagon. Then, to 
take charge of the horses, there were two horse- 
rangers. 

When the meeting place was reached, several 
days elapsed in making arrangements for the 



GREAT-HEART [ 35 



roundup. The time was passed in racing, break- 
ing rough horses or in skylarking. Horse-racing 
was a mania with the cow-punchers, both whites 
and Indians. The horses were ridden bareback. 
Intense excitement preceded the race, and where 
the horses participating were well enough 
known to have partisans there generally arose 
quarrels between the two sides. 

The races were short-distance dashes. Down 
between two thick rows of spectators, some on 
foot and some on horseback, the riders passed. 
Some of the lookers-on yelled and shouted en- 
couragement at the top of their lungs. Some 
fired off their revolvers. All waved their hats 
and cloaks in encouragement. Naturally, the 
excitement made both horses and riders frantical- 
ly eager to win, and when the goal was reached 
they were exhausted with nervous excitement. 

The most exciting and dangerous part of the 
roundup comes when the cattle are stampeded 
by a storm or through fright. Anything may 
start them — the plunge of a horse, the approach 
of a coyote, the arrival of new steers or cows. In 
an instant the herd rises to its feet and rushes 
off. Then the work of the cowboys is cut out for 
them. No matter how rough the ground or how 
black the night, the cow-punchers must ride 



36 ] GREAT-HEART 



without sparing themselves to head them off and 
finally stop them. Even when stopped there is 
danger of them breaking again. Sometimes a 
man gets caught in the rush of the beasts and is 
trampled to death. Roosevelt never experienced 
this danger, but he knew the very hardest part 
of the work. On one occasion he was for thirty- 
six hours in the saddle, dismounting only to 
change horses or to eat. 

At another time he was helping to bring a 
thousand head of young cattle down to his lower 
range. At night he and a cowboy stood guard. 
The cattle had been without water that day, and 
in their thirst they tried to break away. In the 
darkness Roosevelt could dimly see the shadowy 
outlines of the frantic herd. With whip and 
spurs he circled around the herd, turning back 
the beasts at one point just in time to wheel and 
keep them in at another. After an hour of vio- 
lent exertion, by which time he was dripping 
with sweat, he and his companion finally quieted 
the herd. 

On still another occasion Roosevelt was out 
on the plains when a regular blizzard came. The 
cattle began to drift before the storm. They 
were frightened and maddened by the quick, 
sharp flashes of lightning and the stinging rain. 



GREAT-HEART [ 37 



The men darted to and fro before them and be- 
side them, heedless of danger, checking them at 
each point where they threatened to break 
through. The thimder was terrific. Peal fol- 
lowed peal. Each flash of lightning showed a 
dense ray of tossing horns and staring eyes. At 
last, however, when the storm was raging in 
fm-y, and when it seemed impossible to hold the 
herd together any longer, the corrals were 
reached, and by desperate efforts Roosevelt and 
his companions managed to turn the herds into 
the barns. It was such work as this that brought 
Roosevelt self-reliance and hardihood and made 
him in later life a firm advocate of horsemanship. 
Though Roosevelt's ranch life yielded him big 
assets in health and experience, financially it 
proved a failure. It is estimated that he lost 
$100,000 on the venture. "Bill" Sewall testifies 
that Roosevelt shared all gains with Dow and 
him, who were practically his partners, but that 
when the cattle died Roosevelt assumed all losses 
without a word of complaint to his comrades. 

THE GRIZZLY'S TRAIL 

We now enter upon the most adventurous 
part of Roosevelt's Western experiences. Of 
dash, adventure and excitement he had plenty in 



38 ] GREAT-HEART 



his life as a ranchman, and yet through it all a 
still greater adventure called him. About him 
lay the wilderness. In that wilderness lurked 
big game. Roosevelt became a hunter. Some- 
thing of the perils and hardships of the wild life 
he was about to enter upon can best be illustra- 
ted by the story he tells in his book "Ranch Life 
and the Hunting Trail" of the experiences of 
two starving trappers. 

These two men had entered a valley in the 
heart of the mountains where game was so abun- 
dant that they decided to pass the winter there. 
As winter came on they worked hard at putting 
up a log cabin, killing just enough meat for im- 
mediate use. Winter set in with tremendous 
snowstorms. Game left the valley, abandoning 
it for their winter haunts. Starvation stared the 
trappers in the face. One man had his dog with 
him. The other insisted that the dog should be 
killed for food. The dog's owner, who was 
deeply attached to the animal, refused. One 
night the other trapper tried to kill the dog with 
his knife, but failed. The scanty supply of flour 
the partners possessed was now almost exhausted. 
Hunger was beginning to intensify their bad 
feelmgs. Neither dared to sleep for fear that the 
other would kill him. 



GREAT-HEART [ 39 



Finally the man who owned the dog proposed 
that, to give each a chance for life, they should 
separate. He himself agreed to take one-half of 
the handful of flour that was left and to start off 
in an attempt to get home. The other was to stay. 
If one tried to interfere with the other after the 
separation it meant a fight to the death. For 
two days the man and his dog plunged through 
snowdrifts. On the second evening, looking 
back over a high ridge, he saw his companion 
following him. He followed his own trail back, 
lay in ambush and shot down the man following 
him as if he had been a wild beast. The next 
evening he baked his last cake and divided it 
with the dog. Only a short stretch of time stood 
between them and death. Just then, however, 
the dog crossed the tracks of a wolf and followed 
its trail. The man staggered after and came at 
last to where the wolf stood over the body of a 
deer it had killed. The meat of the deer replen- 
ished the strength of the trapper and dog, and 
they continued their journey. A week later they 
reached a miner's cabin. 

While Roosevelt in his hunting experiences 
never had an adventure so harrowing as this, he 
nevertheless managed to crowd into his life as 
many big moments as most professional hunters 



40 ] GREAT-HEART 



and trappers find in a lifetime. At fifteen, an 
age when most boys are only dreaming of be- 
coming huntsmen, Roosevelt killed his first deer. 

His brother, his cousin and himself were 
camping out for the first time in their lives. 
Their camp was located on Lake St. Regis. The 
other two boys went fishing. Roosevelt was not 
overly fond of this sport, so he went off on a 
deer hunt. With him went the two guides, Hank 
Martin and Mose Sawyer. The first day of the 
hunt he not only did not kill a deer — he failed 
to see one that stood within range; and, on the 
way home, shot in mistake for one a large owl 
that was perched on a log. 

The next day, goaded by the teasing of his 
camp mates, he started out again. This time he 
had better luck. As his canoe swung out from 
between forest-lined banks into a little bay, he 
saw, knee-deep among the water lilies that 
fringed the shore, a yearling buck. His first shot 
killed him. 

The youthful adventure helped to stimulate 
Roosevelt's ardor for hunting. One of the rea- 
sons why he went West was that he hoped to 
find big game, and when he found himself upon 
the track of the grizzly he was in his element 
indeed. 



GREAT-HEART [ 41 



We find Roosevelt one day setting out from 
his ranch on a hunt for grizzly on the Big Horn 
Range. His eagerness to come in close contact 
with the grizzly was in no way dampened by the 
fact that a neighbor of his, while prospecting 
with two other men near the headwaters of the 
Little Missouri in the Black Hills country, had 
had a terrible experience with one. 

The neighbor and two other men were walk- 
ing along the river. Two of them followed the 
edge of the stream. The third followed a game 
trail some distance away from them. Suddenly 
the second heard an agonized shout from the 
third man, intermingled with the growling of the 
bear. They rushed to the scene just in time to 
see their companion in close contact with a griz- 
zly. The bear was so close to the man that he 
had no time to fire his rifle, but merely held it 
up as a guard to his head. The immensely mus- 
cular forearm of the grizzly, with nails as strong 
as steel hooks, descended upon the man, striking 
aside the rifle and crushing the man's skull like 
an eggshell. 

Still another of the Colonel's friends, while 
hunting in the Big Horn Mountains, had pur- 
sued a large bear and wounded him. The animal 
turned and rushed at the man, who fired at him 



42 ] GREAT-HEART 



and missed. The bear closed with him and 
passed on, striking only a single blow, yet that 
blow tore the man's collarbone and snapped 
three or four ribs. The shock was so great that 
he died that night. 

With his interest stimulated by such accounts 
of grizzly hunting, Roosevelt set out. It was 
early in September. The weather was cool and 
frosty and the flurries of snow made it easy to 
track the bears. There were plenty of blacktail 
deer in the woods, as well as bands of cow and 
calf elk, or of young bull. There were no signs 
of grizzly however. 

One day Roosevelt and Merrifield separated, 
but at last Roosevelt heard the familiar long- 
drawn shout of a cattleman and dashed toward 
him on his small, wiry cow pony. Merrifield an- 
nounced that he had seen signs of bears about 
ten miles distant. They shifted camp at once 
and rode to the spot where the bear tracks were 
so plentiful. 

As Roosevelt came home toward nightfall 
from a vain hunt, walking through a reach of 
burned forest, he came across the huge half- 
human footprints of a great grizzly which had evi- 
dently passed a short time before. He followed 
the tracks in the fading twilight until it became 



GREAT-HEART [ 43 



too dark to see them, and had to give up the pur- 
suit as darkness closed in about him. The next 
day, toward nightfall, as the two men were again 
returning home without having caught sight of 
the grizzly, they heard the sound of the break- 
ing of a dead stick. It was the grizzly whose 
tracks they had seen around the remains of a 
black deer that Merrifield had shot. Again they 
had to postpone pursuit of him on account of 
darkness, but they made up their minds that 
they would get him the next morning. 

Merrifield was a skilful tracker, and the next 
day he took up the trail at once where it had 
been left off. After a few hundred yards the 
tracks turned off on a well-beaten path made by 
the elk. The beast's footprints were plain in the 
dust. The trail turned off into the tangled 
thicket, within which it was almost certain that 
the quarry could be found. 

Still they followed the tracks, advancing with 
noiseless caution, climbing over dead tree trunks 
and upturned stumps and taking care that no 
branches rustled or caught on their clothes. Sud- 
denly Merrifield sank on his one knee, his face 
ablaze with excitement. Roosevelt strode past 
him with his rifle at the ready. There, not ten 
steps off, the great bear rose slowly from his bed 



44 ] GREAT-HEART 



among young spruces. He had heard his hun- 
ters, but did not know their exact location, for 
he reared up on his haunches and was sidewise 
to them. Then suddenly he caught sight of 
them and dropped on his fores, the hair on his 
neck and shoulders seeming to bristle as he 
turned toward them. 

Roosevelt raised his rifle. The bear's head was 
bent slightly down, and when Roosevelt looked 
squarely into the small, glittering, evil eyes he 
pulled his trigger. The bear half rose, then top- 
pled over in the death throes. The bullet had 
gone into his brain. He was the first grizzly 
Roosevelt had ever seen, and a huge one at that. 
Naturally, he felt proud that within twenty 
seconds from the time he had caught sight of the 
game he had killed it. 

Merrifield's chief feeling was one of disap- 
pointment, not that he had not killed the game, 
but that Roosevelt had shot and killed him be- 
fore the bear had had a chance to fight. Merri- 
field was reckless. He did no fear a grizzly any 
more than he did a jackrabbit. He wanted to 
see the bear come toward them in a typical griz- 
zly charge and to bring him down in the rush. 
However, Roosevelt, not so much a veteran at 
bear-hunting, was quite contented in looking at 



GREAT-HEART [ 45 



the monstrous fellow to have brought him down 
before his charge commenced. 

Lieutenant-Governor William Francis Shee- 
han once told a story illustrative of the Colonel's 
whole-hearted spirit of adventure. Repeating a 
conversation he had with Mr. Roosevelt, Mr. 
Sheehan described the former President as 
standing before the mounted skin of a monster 
grizzly bear which he had shot at close range — 
so close that the odds at one instant seemed 
greatly in favor of the grizzly. After a descrip- 
tion of the dramatic fight the Colonel suddenly 
turned to Sheehan and said: 

"But, Governor, I shall never be satisfied until 
I have killed a grizzly bear with a knife!" 

When one reads of Roosevelt in such sur- 
roundings one does not wonder that the Roose- 
velt home at Sagamore Hill at times resembled 
a veritable menagerie. At one time there were 
a lion, a hyena, a zebra, five bears, a wildcat, a 
coyote, two macaws, an eagle, a barn owl and 
several snakes and lizards. Kangaroo rats and 
flying squirrels slept in the pockets and blouses 
of the Roosevelt children, went to school with 
them and often were guests at dinner. While 
campaigning in Kansas in 1903 a little girl 
brought a baby badger, carried by her brother, 



46 ] GREAT-HEART 



to Roosevelt's train, whence it was later trans- 
ferred to the Sagamore Hill menagerie. There 
was a guinea-pig named Father O' Grady by the 
children, but this proved to be of the softer sex. 
One day two of the children rushed breathlessly 
into a room where the Roosevelts were entertain- 
ing mixed company. "Oh! oh!" they cried. 
"Father O'Grady has had some children!" 

As a result of their closeness to nature Roose- 
velt's sons became sportsmen and naturalists 
worthy of their father. 

Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., killed his first buck 
just before he was fourteen, and his first moose, 
a big bull with horns that spread fifty-six inches, 
just before he was seventeen. Both of these ani- 
mals were killed in the wilderness, on hunting 
trips which tested to the utmost the boy's endur- 
ance and skill. 



IV 



Champion 
of Women and Children 

MANY people misunderstood Roosevelt. 
Seeing the virile, fighting side of his nature, 
they came to look at him as representing strength 
without tenderness. On the contrary, no man was 
more tender to women, children and animals. 
He always impressed his close friend, Jacob Riis, 
as being as tender as a woman. 

One day while Theodore Roosevelt was Assist- 
ant Secretary of the Navy, he prevailed on Mr. 
Riis to go home with him. In those days the 
Roosevelt children were little. Instead of rush- 
ing upon Mr. Roosevelt when he entered the 
door, as was their custom later, they waited their 
father's coming in the nursery. 

Entering the house, Mr. Roosevelt invited Mr. 
Riis to go up with him to see the babies. Mrs. 
Roosevelt met them in the hall with the warning 
that he was not to play bear, that the baby was 
being put to sleep. However, when the two ar- 
rived in the nursery, the baby itself squirmed 
out of the nurse's arms and growled and clawed 
at the father very much like a little bear cub, and, 
I [47] 



48 ] GREAT-HEART 



thus incited, the rest of the children flew upon 
him with all of the amazing vigor of childhood. 
The house was in a turmoil. No menagerie in its 
wildest moment gave forth more shrieks, howls 
and thumps. As a climax the door opened and 
Mrs. Roosevelt, wearing a look of great stern- 
ness, stood viewing the scene. Thereupon her 
husband arose meekly from the floor explaining 
that the baby was thoroughly awake when he ar- 
rived. This story explains the following: 

One day, when Roosevelt was Police Commis- 
sioner, a policeman was ordered before him on 
charges. Roosevelt reviewed his past offences 
and resolved to dismiss him. The stage was set 
for the dismissal; only the formalities remained. 
But someone had told the culprit the Commis- 
sioner's weak side. In the morning as Roosevelt 
came from a romp with his babies, the doomed 
policeman stood before him surrounded by eleven 
weeping youngsters. 

Roosevelt's stern expression relaxed to one of 
instant sympathy. 

"Where is your wife, O'Keefe?" 

"Dead, Sir!" 

Dead! And this man, left alone with all these 
children! Clearly it would be inhuman to dis- 
charge him. He must be given one more chance. 





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^^H^^^^^^B ''5Sv.'.'1|"^ ^ j^^H 


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ROOSEVELT, THE FIGHTER 




ROOSEVELT, THE MAN 



GREAT- HEART [ 49 



Out went the patrolman with his new lease of 
life. And his first duty was to return to his neigh- 
bors in the tenement the nine children he had bor- 
rowed to accompany his own two in his task of 
melting the heart of the Comissioner. 

Some years ago, a man Roosevelt had met out 
West wrote this letter to him: 

"Dear Colonel: I write you because I am 
in trouble. I have shot a lady in the eye. But, 
Colonel, I was not shooting at the lady. I was 
shooting at my wife." 

Roosevelt replied to his friend in need that 
while he appreciated marksmanship in almost 
every form, he drew the line at shooting at ladies, 
whether or not they were related to the man who 
held the gun. 

Roosevelt, much as he understood the char- 
acter of the Western man, was even more inter- 
ested in and sympathetic to the Western women. 
It was on the prairie that Roosevelt learned the 
doctrine which he afterward preached, that "the 
prime work for the average woman must be keep- 
ing the home and rearing her children." When 
with his men on the ranch he listened by hours 
to their accounts of the charms and virtues of 
their sweethearts, while from his own close obser- 
vation he acquired a knowledge of the homely 

TR5 



50 ] GREAT-HEART 



virtues of the women pioneers of the plains that 
led him to show small sympathy in later years 
with the idle, luxury-loving women of the big 
cities. 

In his description of frontier types Roosevelt 
pictured how the grinding work of the wilderness 
drives the beauty and bloom from a woman's 
face long before her youth leaves her. She lives 
in a log hut chinked with moss, or in a sod adobe 
hovel; or in a temporary camp. 

Motherhood comes and leaves her sinewy, 
angular, thin of lip and furrowed of brow. She is 
up early, going about her work in a dingy gown 
and ugly sunbonnet, facing her many hard 
duties, washing and cooking for her husband and 
children ; facing perils and hardships and poverty 
with the courage her husband shows in facing his 
own hard and dangerous lot. She is fond and 
tender toward her children. Yet necessity dic- 
tates that she must bring them up in hardihood. 
One of the wives of Roosevlt's teamsters, when 
her work prevented her giving personal care to 
her flock picketed them out, each child being tied 
by the leg with a long leather string to a stake 
driven in the ground and so placed that it could 
not get into a scuffle with the next child nor get 
its hand on breakable things. 



GREAT-HEART [51 



Independent and resourceful as the frontiers- 
man became in contact with the desolate prairie, 
his wife was no less similarly developed. Roose- 
velt met one of these women living alone in her 
cabin on the plains, having dismissed her erring 
husband some six months previously. Her liv- 
ing she earned by making hunting shirts, leggins 
and gauntlets for neighboring cow-pimchers and 
Indians, and every man who approached her 
cabin door was made to walk the straightest kind 
of line. 

The West had its lewd women — as have our 
big cities today — but Roosevelt testified that 
the sense of honor and dignity of the average 
plainswoman was as high as that found in the 
centers of culture. In the cowboy balls, to which 
men and women flocked from the surrounding 
towns, the greatest decorimi was observed, and 
those behaving unseemly were banished and pun- 
ished with typical cowboy celerity and vim. 

In his later years Roosevelt wrote a vigorous 
paper on the parasite woman, appealing therein 
to American women to rear strong families for 
their country, and to train them to be prepared 
for military service if needed. A Michigan 
womain of the same brave pioneer stamp de- 
scribed above formed the conclusion that Roose- 



52 ] GREAT- HEART 



velt was writing without knowledge of the hard- 
ships many of her sex were forced to undergo, 
and wrote to him this letter: 



"Dear Sir: When you were talking of *race 
suicide' I was rearing a large family on almost 
no income. I often thought of writing to you 
of some of my hardships, and now when 'pre- 
paredness' may take some of my boys, I feel I 
must. I have eleven of my own and brought up 
three stepchildren, and yet, in the thirty years of 
my married life I have never had a new cloak or 
winter hat. I have sent seven children to school 
at one time. I had a family of ten for eighteen 
years, with no money to hire a washerwoman 
though bearing a child every two years. Nine — 
several ^Vough or nearly — of my children have 
got into high school and two into State Normal 
School, and one into the University of Michigan. 
I haven't eaten a paid-meal in twenty years or 
paid for a night's lodging in thirty. Not one of 
the five boys — the youngest is fifteen — uses to- 
bacco or liquor. I have worn men's discarded 
shoes much of the time. I have had little time 
for reading. 

"I think I have served my country. My hus- 
band has been an invalid for six years — leaving 



GREAT-IIEAKT [ 53 



me the care and much work on our httle sandy 
farm. I have bothered you enough. To me race 
suicide has perhaps a different meaning when I 
think my boys may have to face the cannon. 
Respectfully. "MRS " 

Roosevelt^s reply to her was warmly sympa- 
thetic, but there was no withdrawing from the 
principles he had set forth. The following para- 
graphs from his reply illustrate that tender j^et 
just attitude that Roosevelt took toward Ameri- 
can women, including, of course, the women of 
his own household : 

"Now, my dear Mrs. you have described 

a career of service which makes me feel more 
like taking off my hat to you, and saluting you 
as a citizen deserving of the highest honor, than 
I would feel as regards any colonel of a crack 
regiment. But you seem to think, if I under- 
stand your letter aright, that 'preparedness' is 
in some way designed to make your boys food 
for cannon. 

"Now, as a matter of fact, the surest way to 
prevent your boys from being food for cannon 
is to have them, and all the other young men of 
the country — my boys, for instance, and the boys 
of all other fathers and mothers throughout the 



54 ] GREAT-HEART 



country — so trained, so prepared, that it will 
not be safe for any foreign foe to attack us. Pre- 
paredness no more invites war than fire insur- 
ance invites a fire. I shall come back to this mat- 
ter again in a moment. But I will speak to you 
first a word as to what you say about race 
suicide. 

"I have never preached the imposition of an 
excessive maternity on any woman. I have al- 
ways said that every man worth calling such will 
feel a peculiar sense of chivalric tenderness 
toward his wife, the mother of his children. He 
must be unselfish and considerate with her. But, 
exactly as he must do his duty, so she must do 
her duty. I have said that it is self-evident that 
unless the average woman, capable of having 
children, has four, the race will not go forward; 
for this is necessary in order to offset the women 
who for proper reasons do not marry, or who, 
from no fault of their own, have no children, or 
only one or two, or whose children die before 
they grow up. I do not want to see Americans 
forced to import our babies from abroad. I do 
not want to see the stock of people like yourself 
and like my family die out — and you do not 
either ; and it will inevitably die out if the average 
man and the average woman are so selfish and 



GREAT-HEART [ 55 



SO cold that they wish either no children, or just 
one or two children. 

"We have had six children in this family. We 
wish we had more. Now the grandchildren are 
coming along; and I am sure you agree with me 
that no other success in life — not being President, 
or being wealthy, or going to college, or any- 
thing else — comes up to the success of the man 
and woman who can feel that they have done 
their duty and that their children and grand- 
children rise up to call them blessed. 

"Mrs Roosevelt and I have four sons, and 
they are as dear to us as your sons are to you. If 
we now had war, these four boys would all go. 
We think it entirely right that they should go 
if their country needs them. But I do not think 
it fair that they should be sent to defend the boys 
who are too soft or too timid 'to face the cannon/ 
or the other boys who wish to stay at home to 
make money while somebody else protects 
them." 

THE BRINGER OF CULTURE 

In the lore of the Middle West brilliantly 
stands out the figure of Johnny Appleseed, who 
traveled westward distributing apple-seeds to 
the farmers and ranchers, from whence sprang 



56 ] GREAT-HEART 



up the great apple orchards that have blessed 
these regions. 

It was service of a similar kind that Roosevelt 
performed when he went among these primitive 
people of the wilderness. Schools were scarce in 
those days and opportunity for culture was 
almost entirely lacking. But here had come 
among them a man who had graduated from 
one of the great Eastern colleges, and who had 
brought with him a choice library of books that 
contained characters and philosophy entirely 
comprehensible by these untutored minds when 
interpreted by such an enthusiastic and sympa- 
thetic expounder as young Roosevelt. 

On the long winter evenings Roosevelt's fire- 
side became the rendezvous for the ranchers and 
their wives. Roosevelt would select a classic 
story and begin reading. The tale would be a 
familiar one to him, and yet the genius of the 
author would again cast its spell over him, and 
he would read with interest and expression that 
were magnetic. Swiftly the night passed, and 
when in the late hours his hearers went to their 
rest they lay awake remembering the poetry of 
"that chap Browning" or the Rosalind or Lear 
of "Mr. Shakespeare," conning them over in 
their minds until they became part of their 



GREAT- HEART [57 



beings, to be transmitted later to the minds and 
lips of their children, and thus to become a part 
of the civilization of their section. 

To the women, with their starved existence — 
so far as education was concerned — Roosevelt 
proved a benefactor indeed; but no less did he 
administer to the mental craving of his men com- 
rades. 

Monotonous and threadbare grew the conver- 
sation at a cow-camp. Seldom did the talk vary 
from such topics as these, described by him: 

"A bunch of steers had been seen traveling over 
the buttes to the head of Elk Creek. A stray 
horse, with a blurred brand on the left hip, had 
just joined the saddle ponies. The red F. V. 
cow had been bitten by a wolf. The old mule, 
Sawback, was getting over the effects of the 
rattlesnake bite. The river was going down, but 
the fords were still bad, and the quicksand at 
the Caster Trail crossing had worked along so 
that wagons had to be taken over opposite the 
blasted cottonwood. Bronco Jim had tried to 
ride the big, bald-faced sorrel belonging to the 
Oregon horse outfit and had been bucked off and 
his face smashed in. It was agreed that Jim 
'wasn't the sure-enough bronco-buster he 
thought himself,' and he was compared very 



58 ] GREAT-HEART 



unfavorably to various heroes of the quirt and 
spurs who hved in Texas and Colorado." 

These topics having been exhausted, the 
rumor was discussed that the vigilantes had 
given notice to quit to two men who had just 
built a shack at the head of the Little Dry River, 
and whose horses included a suspiciously large 
number of different brands, most of them 
blurred- Then the talk became more personal. 
Roosevelt would be asked to write or post letters 
for the cow-punchers. Then his companions, 
growing friendly, would make him the confident 
of their love affairs, and make him listen for an 
hour to the charms of their sweethearts. 

Here Roosevelt's books stood both him and 
his companions in good stead. No matter what 
adverse conditions surrounded the young ranch- 
owner, favorite volumes were at hand, and out 
they came at the first opportunity. 

On one occasion, while hunting on Beaver 
Creek for a lost horse, he met a cowboy and 
made friends with him. Caught in a heavy snow- 
storm, they lost themselves, and after eight or 
nine hours of drifting, finally came across an 
empty hut near Sentinel Butte. Making their 
horses comfortable in a sheltered nook with hay 
found in an old stack, the two cold and tired men 



GREAT- HEART [59 



sat down to spend the long winter evening to- 
gether. Out of Roosevelt's pocket came a small 
edition of Hamlet. His cowboy companion was 
greatly interested in the reading, and Roosevelt 
tells us that he commented very shrewdly on the 
parts he liked, especially Polonius's advice to 
Laertes. His final comment was extremely grati- 
fying to the man who had introduced to him the 
treasures of the world's greatest dramatist, and 
would doubtless have given great pleasure to the 
immortal bard himself: 

"Old Shakespeare saveyed human natur' 
some!" 

On another evening the men at the Roosevelt 
ranch began to discuss the English soldiers. 
Thereupon Roosevelt got down "Napier" and 
read them extracts from his descriptions of the 
fighting in the Spanish penisula. He also told 
them about the fine appearance and splendid 
horses of the cavalry and hussars he had seen. 

Thus when the East called Roosevelt home 
there was left behind in the minds of the sons and 
daughters of the great West not only the recol- 
lection of a tried and true comrade, but also the 
seeds of a culture whose fruitage is still spring- 
ing forth from the lives he touched. 

From a business standpoint Roosevelt's ranch- 



60 ] GREAT-HEART 



ing venture was a failure. The country was 
poorly adapted to cattle-raising. His reviving 
interest in politics and his engagement to Edith 
Carow came to draw him back to the fields where 
happiness and success waited. Sewall and Dow 
returned East with him. 

The duty of a biographer is to record and not 
to speculate, yet as we look at Roosevelt's later 
life in his unpretentious home at Sagamore 
Hill; when we think of the democratic sewing 
circle at Oyster Bay to which Mrs. Roosevelt 
goes regularly to sew garments for crippled 
children, and when we see the democratic 
simplicity with which Roosevelt mingled with 
his neighbors and shared their experiences and 
confidences; when we read of him or Captain 
Archie playing Santa Claus to the village 
children, we are led to pronounce this judgment, 
which we feel Roosevelt, if he were living, would 
heartily second — that while he gave to the men 
and women of the West the best that was in him, 
he also received from their kind hearts and frank 
and open natures a deepening and ripening of 
his sense of brotherhood that was equivalent in 
value to the finest gifts he gave these frontier 
folks. 



Keeping Fit 



IT is a matter of conjecture how far the atti- 
tude of the doughboy is due to the training 
he got in the army, but the fact remains that 
boxing and wresthng have been recognized and 
practised by our army officers as valuable ad- 
juncts to military training. Uncle Sam encour- 
aged the science of fisticuffs on shipboard and in 
the training camps, under a committee headed 
by no other than the famous ex-champion, James 
J. Corbett, because the positions and motions 
used in boxing are almost the same as those used 
in bayonet practice. The development of game- 
ness in the recruit is another important benefit 
derived from the sport. 

One of the anecdotes that came out of the 
trenches has for its hero a short but stocky Yank 
who, in an encounter with a huge Prussian, 
dropped his rifle and went for his foe with his 
fists. He knocked the fight out of the surprised 
German and brought him in a prisoner. An 
officer who had watched his exploit thought it 
proper to caution him as to the danger that lay 
in this departure from the rules of attack. 

"Danger!" spoke up the Yank, "there isn't a 
[61] 



62 ] GREAT-HEART 



Fritz alive that I can't lick with just my fists!" 
Theodore Roosevelt, had he realized his desire 
to serve with the colors during the world conflict, 
would undoubtedly have been an enthusiastic 
spectator at such of the army's ring battles as 
were within reach of him. Indeed, had he been 
still occupant of the White House it would not 
have been surprising to have heard of his inviting 
champions from the various cantonments to test 
their skill under the White House roof. Mr. 
Roosevelt was first drawn to two naval chap- 
lains, Fathers Chidwick and Rainey, through 
his discovery that each of them had bought sets 
of boxing gloves and encouraged their crews in 
boxing. While he was President fencing or box- 
ing were Mr. Roosevelt's favorite indoor exer- 
cises. He was also intensely interested in jiu- 
jitsu, the "muscleless art." To perfect himself 
in this exercise he employed one of the best of 
the Japanese instructors, and took a course of 
twenty lessons. 

After learning the various grips, the President 
would practise them upon his teacher. He soon 
mastered the science, and his enthusiasm over it 
led him to introduce jiu-jitsu instruction at 
Annapolis and West Point. 

When Mr. Roosevelt entered upon his public 



GREAT- HEART [ 63 



career heavy burdens were laid upon him, and to 
keep in condition to meet the hard physical and 
mental strain he again turned to boxing and 
wrestling for exercise. When Governor of New 
York the champion middleweight wrestler of 
America came several evenings a week to wrestle 
with him. The news of the purchase of a wrest- 
ling mat for the Governor's mansion at Albany 
created consternation on the part of the Con- 
troller, but was greeted with great enthusiasm 
by the red-blooded men to whom the Governor 
had become an idol. Many of these would have 
paid a great price to have been able to stand 
at the edge of the mat and cheer their 
champion in his strenuous amusement. To the 
middleweight champion the job was a hard one. 
Not because he experienced any difficulty in 
downing the Governor, but because he was so 
awed by the Governor's position and responsi- 
bilities that he was always in dire anxiety lest 
the Governor should break an arm or crack a rib. 
This gingerly attitude of his opponent exasper- 
ated Roosevelt. He didn't feel that it was fair 
for him to be straining like a tiger to get a half- 
Nelson hold on the champion while the latter 
seemed to feel that he must play the nurse to 
him. After repeated urgings he managed to get 



64 ] GREAT-HEART 



the champion to throw him about in real earnest 
— then he was satisfied. 

Colonel Roosevelt relates in his reminiscences 
that, while he was in the Legislature, he had as a 
sparring partner a second-rate prizefighter who 
used to come to his rooms every morning and put 
on the gloves for a half hour. One morning he 
failed to arrive, but a few days later there came 
a letter from him. It developed that he was then 
in jail; that boxing had been simply an avoca- 
tion with him, and that his principal business 
was that of a burglar. 

Roosevelt was fond of boxing with "Mike" 
Donovan, trainer at the New York Athletic 
Club, as well as with William Muldoon, the 
wrestler and trainer. His opponents testify that 
the Colonel was handicapped by his poor sight. 
He wanted to see his adversary's eyes — to catch 
the gleam that comes before a blow. Roosevelt 
always maneuvered to see his opponent's face, 
and he liked to "mix in" when boxing. 

Hard and heavy was the Colonel's method, 
and his opponents forced the colonel to adapt 
his plan of fighting to theirs. It did not matter 
to Roosevelt. It was the striving, not the result, 
that interested him. 

An illustration of Roosevelt's fondness for the 



GREAT- HEART [ 65 



Japanese art of wrestling is found in this extract 
from the diary of John Hay, Secretary of State: 

"April 26 — At the Cabinet meeting this morn- 
ing the President talked of his Japanese wrest- 
ler, who is giving him lessons in jiu-jitsu. He 
says the muscles of his throat are so powerfully 
developed by training that it is impossible for 
any ordinary man to strangle him. If the Presi- 
dent succeeds once in a while in getting the better 
of him he says, 'Good! Lovely I' " 

Lieutenant Fortescue, a distant relative of the 
Roosevelt family, sometimes put on the gloves 
with the Colonel. One day, feeling in fighting 
trim, Fortescue asked the Colonel to box with 
him. Finally the Colonel agreed to go four 
rounds. According to Joseph Grant, detective 
sergeant of the Washington Police Department, 
detailed to the White House to "guard" the 
President, it was the fastest bout he ever saw. 

"The Colonel began to knock Lieutenant 
Fortescue right and left in the second round," 
said the detective. "His right and left got to 
the army officer's jaw time after time, and the 
bout was stopped in the third round to prevent 
the army man from getting knocked out. Then 
the Colonel turned to me and said: 'I think I 
can do the same to you. Put on the gloves !' 

TR6 



66 ] GREAT-HEART 



"I drew them on reluctantly, and I put up the 
fight of my life. The best I could do was to pre- 
vent a decision and get a draw." 

It was a sporting rule of the Colonel's not only 
to give as good a blow as he could, but also to 
take without squirming the hardest blow his 
opponent could deliver. The wrestler who hesi- 
tated to stand him on his head because he was 
Governor of New York exasperated him; nor 
would he have permitted a man to spar with him 
who held back his blows. 

Nothing illustrates this rule better than an 
episode which the Colonel himself made public. 
In October, 1917, in the course of an interview 
with newspaper men, he told this story in ex- 
planation of his relinquishing the gloves : 

"When I was President I used to box with 
one of my aids, a young captain in the artillery. 
One day he cross-countered me and broke a blood 
vessel in my left eye. I don't know whether this 
is known, but I never have been able to see out 
of that eye since. I thought, as only one good 
eye was left me, I would not box any longer." 

This story was too promising for the news- 
paper men to let drop without endeavoring to 
have it amplified by the soldier who delivered 
the blow. 



GREAT-HEART [ 67 



A few days later, in "The New York Times," 
appeared this interview with Colonel Dan T. 
Moore, of the 310th Field Artillery Regiment, 
79th Division, National Army: 

"Colonel Dan T. Moore, of the 310th Field 
Artillery Regiment, 79th Division, National 
Army, admits he struck the blow that destroyed 
the sight of Colonel Roosevelt's eye. 

" 'I am sorry I struck the blow. I'm sorry the 
Colonel told about it, and I'm sorry my identity 
has been so quickly uncovered. I give you my 
word I never knew I had blinded the Colonel in 
one eye until I read his statement in the paper. I 
instantly knew, however, that I was the man 
referred to, because there was no other answer- 
ing the description he gave who could have done 
it. I shall write the Colonel a letter in a few 
days, expressing my regrets at the serious results 
of the blow. 

" 'I was a military aid at the White House in 
1905. The boxers in the White House gym were 
the President, Kermit Roosevelt and myself. The 
President went further afield for his opponents 
in other sports, but when he wanted to don the 
boxing gloves he chose Kermit or myself.' 

" 'Tell about the blow that blinded the Presi- 
dent.* 



68 ] GREAT-HEART 



" 'I might as well try to tell about the shell that 
killed any particular soldier in this war. When 
you put on gloves with President Roosevelt it 
was a case of fight all the way, and no man in 
the ring with him had a chance to keep track of 
particular blows. A good fast referee might have 
known, but nobody else. The Colonel wanted 
plenty of action, and he usually got it. He had 
no use for a quitter or one who gave ground, and 
nobody but a man willing to fight all the time 
and all the way had a chance with him. That's 
my only excuse for the fact that I seriously 
injured him. There was no chance to be careful 
of the blows. He simply wouldn't have stood 
for it.' " 

Roosevelt to his last days remained keenly in- 
terested in ring champions. He numbered among 
his prizefighting friends John L. Sullivan, Bob 
Fitzsimmons, Battling Nelson and many another 
man whose fame was won by strength and skill 
in the ring. Among his treasures is the pen-holder 
Bob Fitzsimmons made for him out of a horse- 
shoe, and the gold-mounted rabbit's foot which 
John L. Sullivan gave to him for a talisman 
when he went on his African trip. 

He championed the cause of prizefighters 
on many occasions, though never hesitating to 



GREAT-HEART [ 69 



denounce the crookedness that has attended the 
commercializing of the ring. He held that 
powerful, vigorous men of strong animal 
development must have some way in which their 
spirits can find vent. His acts while Police Com- 
missioner of New York show clearly how he dis- 
tinguished between the art of boxing itself and 
the men who are trying to make money out of it. 
On one hand, he promoted the establishment of 
boxing clubs in bad neighborhoods in order to 
draw the attention of street gangs from knifing 
and gun-fighting. On the other hand, finding that 
the prize ring had become hopelessly debased and 
run for the benefit of low hangers-on, who per- 
mitted brutality in order to make money out of 
it, he aided, as Governor, in the passage of a bill 
putting a stop to professional boxing for money. 



VI 



Roosevelt's "^^Cops 



r>!) 



THE New York Police Department needed 
a cleaning up. The force at that time was 
under a heavy cloud. There had been a Mayor- 
ality election. Tammany had made a hard fight 
but the Republican candidate. Strong, had 
been elected. The vote meant that the citizens 
thought the time had come for a New York police 
reform. Mayor Strong asked Roosevelt, then 
serving on the national Civil Service Commis- 
sion, to be Police Commissioner. 

Roosevelt's friends thought that he was too 
big a man to take such a position. He saw a 
work that needed to be done. 

Proctor, a friend and fellow worker, tried to 
persuade him not to undertake the job. Roosevelt 
had given the matter earnest thought. He be- 
lieved himself capable of bringing about the 
necessary reforms. He knew that such a work 
would be of great benefit to his fellow citizens. 

"Proctor," he said, "it is my duty. I am going." 

"Go then!" said Proctor. "You must always 
have your own way. Yet I believe you are right. 
Clean up the city thoroughly!" 

Roosevelt faced a bigger job than he knew. 
[70] 



GREAT- HEART [71 



The metropolitan police system was in the hands 
of corrupt politicians. The Tammany ring exer- 
cised a tyranny over the policemen. Ii; compe- 
tency, immorality and dishonesty honeycombed 
the department. Many of the policemen, instead 
of being a protection to the people, were a 
menace. 

Promotions went by favor and money. The 
man who wanted to become a policeman could 
get the job for from $200 to $300. A police 
lieutenant could buy his appointment for from 
$10,000 up. The men who secured positions in 
this way paid the money with the expectation of 
getting it back through graft. They had free 
rope so long as they delivered to the political 
leaders half of their spoils. 

If a saloonkeeper wanted to obey the law and 
tried to get along without paying tribute to the 
policemen of his district, he found that a rival 
saloonkeeper was being accorded extraordinary 
privileges in order that he himself might be either 
ruined or forced to "come across." Gambling 
dens, saloons and disorderly houses were free 
from punishment so long as they paid toll. Vice 
flaunted itself in the face of the law-abiding 
element of the city. 

The very coming of Roosevelt to Mulberry 



72 ] GREAT-HEART 



Street was a challenge to the disorderly and cor- 
rupt elements of the metropolis. His friends 
warned him that other commissioners, with good 
intentions, had tried to do what he was about to 
attempt, but had found the police force so full 
of jealousy, favoritism and blackmail that little 
progress could be made. 

"Tom" Byrnes, a detective of national fame, 
was the head of the New York police at that time. 
Roosevelt decided that reform should begin at 
the top. He dismissed Byrnes. The latter hurled 
at him this challenge: 

"The system will break your opposition. You 
will give in, for you are only human, after all." 

Roosevelt kept on. No one was allowed any- 
thing to say concerning his appointments and 
promotions. Those who were physically and 
morally weak he banished from the service. Those 
who showed merit and faithfulness he promoted. 

He started in at once to acquire an intimate 
knowledge of the men who worked under him. 
He accomplished this by making personal tours 
at night through the various police districts. 
Francis E. Leupp, whose previously-mentioned 
book, "The Man Roosevelt," will always be a 
fruitful source to Roosevelt's biographers, gives 
this description of such an expedition : 



GREAT- HEART [ 73 



HAROUN-AL-RASCHID 

"The friend (Leupp) found the Commissioner 
at the appointed place and hour, armed only with 
a little stick and a written list of the patrolmen's 
posts in the district which was to be visited. They 
walked over each beat separately. In the first 
three beats they found only one man on post. 
One of the others had gone to assist the man on 
the third, but there was no trace of the third man's 
whereabouts. They came upon a patrolman 
seated on a box with a woman. 

" 'Patrolman,' asked the Commissioner, 'are 
you doing your duty on post 27?' 

"The fellow jumped up in a hurry. This pedes- 
trian, though unknown to him, was obviously 
familiar with police matters; so he stammered 
out, with every attempt to be obsequious: 'Yes, 
sir; I am, sir.' 

" 'Is it all right for you to sit down?' inquired 
the mysterious stranger. 

" 'Yes, sir — no, sir — well, sir, I wasn't sitting 
down. I was just waiting for my partner, the 
patrolman on the next beat. Really, I wasn't 
sitting down.' 

" 'Very well,' said the stranger, cutting him 
short and starting on. 



74 ] GREAT-HEART 



"The officer ran along, explaining again with 
much volubility that he had not been sitting down 
— he had just been leaning a little against some- 
thing while he waited. 

" 'That will do; you are following me off post. 
Go back to your beat now and present yourself 
before me at headquarters at half-past nine in the 
morning. I am Commissioner Roosevelt.' 

"Another three blocks and the strollers came 
upon a patrolman chatting with a man and a 
woman. They passed the group, went a little 
way, and returned; the woman was gone, but 
the patrolman and the man were still there, and 
deep in conversation. The talk was interrupted 
to enable the officer to answer the Commissioner's 
questions. The man seized the opportunity to 
slip off. 

" 'They were drunk, sir, a little intoxicated, 
sir,' was the patrolman's excuse, as he caught an 
inkling of the situation. *I was just trying to 
quiet them down a bit. I'm sorry, sir, very sorry.' 

" 'That's enough. Come to Commissioner 
Roosevelt's office at half-past nine.' 

"In search of the roundsman the Commissioner 
started, to call him to account for all this laxity 
in discipline. The roundsman was found gossip- 
ing with two patrolmen on another beat. 



GREAT-HEART [ 75 



" 'Which of you men belongs here?' demanded 
the Commissioner, addressing the patroknen. 

"They and their companion met the inqviry 
defiantly. One of the trio retorted: 'What busi- 
ness is that of yours?' 

"The Commissioner made no response except 
to repeat his question in another form: 'Which 
one of you is covering beat 31 ?' " 

It was now plain that they were in trouble. 
By the light of a neighboring gas lamp the 
roundsman recognized the interrogator's face. 
He cast a significant look at one of his com- 
panions, who answered meekly enough: "It's me, 
sir." 

The other told where he belonged and left 
quickly for his post, while the roundsman made 
a poor fist of explaining that he was "just admon- 
ishing the patrolmen to move around and do their 
duty" when the commissioner came up. 

"You may call on me at half-past nine and 
tell me all about it," was the response. "I haven't 
time now to listen." 

The culprits, when they appeared the next 
morning, had every conceivable excuse for their 
shortcomings. Many of them pleaded that this 
was their first offense. 

"Take care that you do not do it a second time," 



76 ] GREAT-HEAET 

was Roosevelt's response. "I am going to see 
with my own eyes how you men employ your 
time." 

On the other hand, where policemen had been 
found to have performed their duties well, they 
were also ordered to call at headquarters the next 
day, but instead of being reprimanded like the 
others, they were warmly praised. For the first 
time each man had a show for promotion on his 
merits. Neither politics or religion counted. The 
man who did a brave deed was promoted. The 
man who was found corrupt was "broken." That 
was all there was to it. It required no pull or 
money to become a member of the police force 
when Roosevelt had charge of it. This is illus- 
trated by his selection of one of his policemen 
from the Bowery branch of the Young Men's 
Christian Association. He tells the story that 
he had gone to the branch of the association one 
night and the secretary informed him that they 
had a young man who had just rescued a woman 
from a burning building, showing great coolness 
and courage. 

The Commissioner was interested — brave men 
always attracted him. He asked to see the young 
man, who was a Russian and who had some years 
ago come to America during one of the waves 



GREAT- HEART [ 77 



of persecution in the realm of the Czar. He had 
been studying in the association classes for some 
time and wanted employment. Physically he 
was of the right type, and he passed his examina- 
tion for the force. 

He made one of the best policemen in the city, 
and in consequence of his pay he was able to 
provide for his mother and his old grandmother 
and to start his small brothers and sisters in life. 
Said Colonel Roosevelt, "He was already a good 
son and brother, so that it was not surprising that 
he made a good policeman." 

Roosevelt's strenuous and novel methods soon 
began to count. Instead of being tools of black- 
mailers, the men became self-respecting and 
"straight." It became a badge of honor to be 
known as a "Roosevelt cop." 

Mr. Enright, the present Chief of the New 
York Police Department and an old member of 
the force, testifies to the remarkable executive 
ability shown by Roosevelt. "He was the first 
Commissioner to inaugurate a strict civil service 
examination," said Mr. Enright, "and he sent 
out a letter requesting 1,000 young men through 
the state to enter the examination and become 
members of the force. He tested them very 
severely, asking questions on history and geog- 



78 ] GREAT-HEART 



raphy. One of his questions was to name five 
states west of the Mississippi River and give the 
capitals. Another was to name five consecutive 
Presidents. 

"He made drastic rules to enforce the excise 
law in those days, and on many Sundays used 
the whole Police Department in his work by 
placing a uniformed patrolman in front of the 
door of every saloon." 

Another warm admirer of Colonel Roosevelt 
is Captain Bourke, who received from Roosevelt 
his first promotion after he had arrested Mike 
Callahan, owner of a saloon at Mott Street and 
Chatham Square, who had been violating the 
excise law. Callahan was credited with being 
immune to arrest, due to his influence with poli- 
ticians, and Bourke made the arrest after he had 
been only six weeks on the force. It was rumored 
that Bourke would be dismissed for his act, but 
when Callahan was arraigned and convicted 
Bourke was promoted. 

Certain elements of the city rebelled against 
Roosevelt's rigid enforcement of the excise laws 
and organized a parade in protest. A reviewing 
stand was built and, unknown to the promoters, 
Colonel Roosevelt slipped into the stand. At the 
head of a division was a stout German — a veteran 



GREAT- HEART [ 79 



of the Franco- German War. Roosevelt's en- 
deavor to deprive him of his Sunday beer had 
aroused his wrath and as he passed the platform 
he shouted scornfully in German: 

"Now, where is that Roosevelt?" 

Mr. Roosevelt, leaning over the side of the 
stand, queried, also in German: 

"Here I am. What will you, comrade?" 

The astonished German when it dawned upon 
him that Roosevelt had heard him, raised his hat 
and shouted: "Hurrah for Roosevelt!" Roose- 
velt's good humor caught the crowd. The cheer 
was repeated and the demonstration turned to 
one for the commissioner instead of against him. 

On one occasion when Roosevelt was on a night 
tour of investigation, he walked around a certain 
beat three times without being able to find his 
man. Just as he was about to leave, a quarrel 
occurred in a cafe and the owner came out on the 
sidewalk and knocked with a stick as a signal 
that he needed police protection. Three times he 
rapped, but the policeman did not come. Roose- 
velt heard him say: 

"Where in thunder is the scoundrel sleeping? 
He should have told me that he had given up 
sleeping in the barber shop so that I could have 
found him." 



80 ] GREAT-HEART 



The next morning the policeman received a 
summons to headquarters to explain why he had 
changed his sleeping place. 

It is also told of Roosevelt that an anti-Hebrew 
lecturer, intending to denounce Jews, asked for 
police protection at a lecture. The protection 
was promised and sent — thirty Hebrew police- 
men, whose presence so awed the speaker that his 
lecture became quite tame. 

The attachment of members of the Jewish race 
for Roosevelt was illustrated at his funeral. The 
one man who was permitted to sit alone in the 
trophy room at Sagamore Hill, with the body 
of the Colonel, was Lieutenant Otto Raphael of 
the New York Police Force, a Hebrew of the 
East side. Mr. Roosevelt, in his biography, de- 
scribes Raphael as "a powerful fellow with a 
good-humored face. He and I were both 'straight 
New Yorkers,' to use the vernacular. To show 
our community of feeling and our grasp of the 
facts of life, I may mention that we were almost 
the only men in the Police Department who 
picked Fitzsimmons as a winner over Corbett." 

Captain William B. Sullivan, now in command 
of the Gates Avenue Police Station, Brooklyn, 
who served as bodyguard to Roosevelt while he 
was Police Commissioner, attests that Roosevelt 



GREAT- HEART [81 



was a born policeman. "There wasn't a man in 
the department," said SuUivan, "that he didn't 
know by name." 

While prosecuting his fight for the enforce- 
ment of the Sunday laws, Roosevelt made the 
police enforce a regulation which declared that 
ice must not be sold after 10 o'clock in the morn- 
ing on Sundays. This proved to be a real hard- 
ship to the masses of the East . side. A strong 
appeal was made to the commissioner to be less 
severe in the prosecution of this law, but he felt 
that he was in the right and kept to his course. 

Then a reporter wrote a story of the death of 
a little girl in a tenement on the East Side. The 
narrative said that the mother had gone to buy 
ice for her after 10 o'clock on Sunday morning 
and that the iceman was arrested for selling it, 
and in the mother's absence the child was said 
to have died. 

This tale proved to be nothing more or less 
than a fable, ^vritten to show what could happen 
under the continued enforcement of this law. 
Roosevelt furiously denounced both the reporter 
and the editor of the newspaper which published 
this story, yet he soon withdrew his opposition 
to the selling of ice on Sunday. He said that he 
had received more than two hundred letters 

TR7 



82 ] GREAT-HEART 



because of the story and that some of the women 
who wrote him declared that they would like to 
tear him to pieces. 

In spite of the many bitter battles Roosevelt 
faced as Police Commissioner, he never lost his 
kindness of heart. He found one gray-haired 
veteran who had saved twenty-eight lives at the 
risk of his own. All of the recognition he had 
earned from the Police Board for this heroic 
deed was the privilege of buying a new uniform 
at his own expense, after he ruined his old one 
in the rescue of the lives. 

The Police Board resolved, at Roosevelt's re- 
quest, that the clothes ruined in rescuing a life 
on duty should be paid for by the department. 

Children found him always a warm, helpful 
friend. When things happened in their neigh- 
borhood that did violence to their youthful sense 
of justice, they came to him with their complaints 
and, if it were at all possible, he adjusted them. 

His enemies tried many times to "get some- 
thing on him." One night they had him shad- 
owed, thinking to catch him off his guard. News 
came to him of their attempt. He bridled with 
indignation. "They found me going home to my 
babies. Let them make the most of that," he 
cried. 



GKEAT-IIEART [ 83 



While Police Commissioner, Roosevelt acted 
also as a member of the Department of Health. 
Here, working hand in hand with Jacob Riis, he 
did much to make conditions better for the poor. 
In those days it was the children that were the 
greatest sufferers from the lack of health laws. 

While on his night visits Roosevelt went into 
dark courts and entered foul tenements to dis- 
cover for himself the misery that lay within their 
walls. At his recommendation, the worst of these 
shacks were bought by the city and torn down. 
Fire-traps and disease-holes were abolished. 
Public playgrounds and parks in the crowded 
districts were laid out. Even in such good work 
Roosevelt met with opposition. He was sued by 
two landlords who had been forced to tear down 
their old buildings, but the court upheld his 
action. 

Throughout his term of office he followed the 
rule he had inaugurated while Civil Service Com- 
missioner of giving the widest publicity to every- 
thing that went on in his department. He gave 
full access to newspaper men so that the public 
could know exactly what was going on. Any one 
could visit him in his own office and he tried to 
help everybody who desired help. 

Roosevelt's attitude toward the commercialized 



84 ] GREAT-HEART 



social evil in the red-light districts was one of 
determined and unwavering opposition. 

In his autobiography he states that he con- 
sidered the social evil the saddest part of his 
police work. He made it a rule to treat the men 
caught in raids on houses of ill fame precisely as 
the women were treated. It was his belief that 
by treating men and women on an exact equality 
for the same act much could be done to minimize 
the evil. His judgment was that the same moral 
level for both sexes must be achieved by raising 
the standard for the man and not by lowering it 
for the woman. 

As a remedy for these evils Roosevelt advo- 
cated higher wages for girls, early marriages and 
a co-operation of nation, state and municipality 
to crush commercialized vice. 

The verdict of history was that Roosevelt was 
in advance of his time in his battle for righteous- 
ness within the police ranks of New York. He 
did a great work, but the job he had undertaken 
would have worn out a hundred Roosevelts. 

He resigned from the department on April 17, 
1897, to accept an appointment from the Mc- 
Kinley administration as Assistant Secretary of 
the Navy. 



VII 

Roosevelt's Influence 
on American Naval Affairs 

IN 1897 the menace of war hung heavy above 
America. Spain's barbarous rule in Cuba 
had stirred the American conscience. It became 
plain that it was the duty of America to become 
the protector of the sunny island that cried out 
to it for deliverance from the oppression of the 
Old World power. 

Cuba, under Spain's management, was a pest 
hole of yellow fever. Her government was vile 
and corrupt. The Spanish rulers crushed remon- 
strances with blood and iron. 

A new American navy was then being built. 
Before it began, Roosevelt himself said, America 
was not in a position to fight Spain or anyone 
else. Timidly and haltingly, contrasting strongly 
with America's present-day naval programme, 
the work had been begun by the country. The 
need was felt for a man of energetic character, 
modern methods and foresight to put the fleet in 
condition for war. Roosevelt's work as Police 
Commissioner had made him famous throughout 
the country, and the nation met with hearty 

[85] 



86 ] GKEAT-HEART 



approval President McKinley's appointment of 
him as Assistant Secretary of the Navy. { 

It was Senator H. C. Lodge, of Massachusetts; 
a long and close friend of Roosevelt, who worked i 
hardest for his appointment. Fifteen years 
before, Roosevelt had written "The History of 
the Naval War of 1812," and since that time had 
taken a deep interest in the navy. 

He was a strong opponent of that class of 
impractical men typified by a Senator who, in 
answer to a question as to what we would do if we 
were suddenly attacked by a foreign power, 
replied: 

"We would build a battleship in every creek." 

Roosevelt, in his autobiography, thus de- 
scribes how gingerly the American people went 
about the work of building the ships that later 
won the battle of Santiago Bay: 

"We built some modern cruisers to start with, 
the people who felt that battleships were wicked 
compromising with their misguided consciences 
by saying that the cruisers could be used 'to 
protect our commerce' — which they could not be., 
unless they had battleships to back them. 

"Then we attempted to build more powerful 
fighting vessels, and as there was a section of the 
public which regarded battleships as possessing 



GREAT-HEART [ 87 



a name immorally suggestive of violence, we com- 
promised by calling the new ships armored crui- 
sers, and making them combine with exquisite 
nicety all the defects and none of the virtues of 
both types. Then we got to the point of building 
battleships. 

"But there still remained a public opinion as 
old as the time of Jefferson which thought that 
in the event of war all our problem ought to be 
one of coast defence; that we should do nothing 
except repel attack ; an attitude about as sensible 
as that of a prizefighter who expected to win by 
merely parrying instead of hitting. 

"To meet the susceptibilities of this large class 
of well-meaning people we provided for the bat- 
tleships under the name of "coast defence battle- 
ships,' meaning thereby that we did not make 
them quite as seaworthy as they ought to have 
been, or with quite as much coal capacity as they 
ought to have had. Then we decided to build real 
battleships. 

"But there still remained a lingering remnant 
of public opinion that clung to the coast defence 
theory, and we met this in beautiful fashion by 
providing for 'seagoing coast defence battle- 
ships,' the fact that the name was a contradic- 
tion in terms being of very small consequence as 



88 ] GREAT-HEART 



compared to the fact that we did thereby get 
real battleships. 

"Our men had to be trained to handle the ships 
singly and in fleet formation, and they had to be 
trained to use the new weapons of precision with 
which the ships were armed. 

"Not a few of the older officers, kept in the 
service under our foolish rule of pure seniority 
promotion, were not competent for the task; but 
a proportion of the older officers were excellent, 
and this was true of almost all the younger 
officers. 

"They were naturally first-class men, trained 
in the admirable naval school at Annapolis. They 
were overjoyed that at last they were given 
proper instruments to work with, and they 
speedily grew to handle their ships individually 
in the best fashion. They were fast learning to 
handle them in squadron and fleet formation; 
but when war with Spain broke out they had as 
yet hardly grasped the principles of modern sci- 
entific naval gunnery." 

While bearing the title of Assistant to Secre- 
tary of the Navy John D. Long, Roosevelt's work 
was soon felt in every department of the navy. 
He found out that many evils had grown up that 
would seriously handicap the department if sud- 



GREAT- HEART [ 89 



denly brought face to face with the problem of 
preparing for war. He therefore began a thor- 
ough overhauling of the various bureaus, cutting 
red tape in every direction. The list of merchant 
vessels that could be drafted for an auxiliary navy 
was incomplete and full of errors. This he 
revised. 

Meanwhile the good offices extended by the 
United States to bring about peace between 
Spain and the Cubans who had rebelled against 
her tyranny were refused by Spain. She even 
refused to consider selling Cuba to the United 
States. The natives cried to the United States 
for help. 

The commercial interests of our country in 
Cuba also required protection. Public opinion 
began to demand armed intervention. 

President IMcKinley, a man wholly inclined to 
peace, hesitated. Roosevelt, however, had become 
convinced that the interests of humanity required 
a declaration of war against Spain. He felt that 
Spain should be made to withdraw from Ameri- 
can soil. He cited the Monroe Doctrine as one of 
his chief reasons. 

Francis E. Leupp, in his book "The Man 
Roosevelt," thus describes Roosevelt's attitude at 
this time: 



90 ] GREAT-HEART 



"One Sunday morning in March, 1898, we 
were sitting in his Hbrary discussing the signifi- 
cance of the news/ that Cervera's squadron was 
about to sail for Cuba, when he suddenly rose and 
brought his hands together with a resounding 
clap. 

" 'If I could do what I pleased,' he exclaimed, 
'I would send Spain notice today that we should 
consider her dispatch of that squadron a hostile 
act. Then, if she didn't heed the warning, she 
would have to take the consequences.' 

" 'You are sure,' I asked, 'that it is with un- 
friendly intent that she is sending the squadron?' 

" 'What else can it be? The Cubans have no 
navy; therefore the squadron cannot be coming 
to fight the insurgents. The only naval power 
interested in Cuban affairs is the United States. 
Spain is simply forestalling the "brush" which i 
she knows, as we do, is coming sooner or later.' 

" 'And if she refused to withdraw the orders 
to Cervera' — 

" 'I should send out a squadron to meet his on 
the high seas and smash it! Then I would force 
the fighting from that day to the end of the 



war.' " 



The President's Cabinet was divided in its 
opinion. The President himself, surrounded by 



GREAT- HEART [91 



men of different views, remained in a quandary. 

One day the President learned that Roosevelt 
had stated what course he would pursue. 
McKinley sent for Roosevelt and heard his plans. 

Later in the day, at a Cabinet meeting, Mc- 
Kinley remarked: 

"Gentlemen, not one of you have put half so 
much enthusiasm into your expressions as Mr. 
Roosevelt, our Assistant Secretary of the Navy. 
He has mapped out a programme for the im- 
pending war!" 

"Let's ask him to explain it!" one of the secre- 
taries said, rather jocosely. 

McKinley sent for Roosevelt and asked him 
some leading questions. Roosevelt urged that 
Spain be warned that she must take the conse- 
quences if the fleet came to our waters. McKinley 
remarked that, as the country was still at peace 
with Spain, to interfere with her fleet would be 
an act of war. Roosevelt replied that Spain 
should be made to understand that the sending 
of her fleet to America would be considered by us 
an act of war. Roosevelt then launched upon his 
war plan. With characteristic gestures and ex- 
pressions he set forth what he would do to Spain 
if she did not consent to the just demands of the 
United States. 



92 ] GREAT- HEART 



The members of the Cabinet complimented 
him, patted him on the back, and, as he bowed 
himself out, wondered whether this was just a 
radical young enthusiast or indeed a born leader. 
Some of them afterward told of the scene in the 
Cabinet chamber, and the tale was gossiped 
throughout official circles as a good joke on 
Roosevelt. 

Meanwhile, with the care of the fleet resting 
largely on his shoulders, Roosevelt toiled to 
secure from Congress appropriations that would 
put it in first-class fighting condition. 

Interesting, in view of our modern naval 
appropriations, is the following incident in 
Roosevelt's battles to secure naval appropri- 
ations : 

On one occasion he asked for $500,000 for the 
purpose of buying ammunition. Congress gave 
it to him. A few months later he asked for 
$800,000 more. Congress asked what had become 
of the first $500,000. 

"We spent it for powder and guns used in 
target practice," said Roosevelt. 

"What will you do with this $800,000?" a 
Congressman queried. 

"Spend it in the same way," Roosevelt 
promptly replied. 



GREAT- HEART [ 93 



He got the money. 

In addition to improving the marksmanship 
of the navy Roosevelt also took many other im- 
portant steps in preparation for war. Feeling 
that the United States must soon land troops in 
Cuba, he bought and equipped transports. He 
found jealousy existing between regular officers 
and engineer officers, and worked hard to 
remove this. He formed the United States war- 
ships stationed on the Atlantic into one squad- 
ron and drilled them so that they could act in 
concert if war came. He selected depots for fuel, 
provisions and munitions. 

When Admiral Dewey found coal and am- 
munition at Hong Kong at the outbreak of the 
war, and was thus enabled to reach Manila a 
week ahead of his time, it was due to the fore- 
sight and energy of Roosevelt that this was 
accomplished. 

There were profiteers in those days, too. 
Roosevelt, in buying ships to carry naval sup- 
plies, found himself forced to do business with 
them. Ships were scarce, and sometimes those 
available were offered by their owners at exorbi- 
tant prices. Here is the way Leupp heard Roose- 
velt handle a lawyer who was representing one of 
these extortionate firms: 



94 ] GREAT-HEAUT 



"Don't you feel ashamed to come to me today 
with another offer after what you did yesterday? 
Don't you think that to sell one rotten ship to 
the government is enough for a single week? Are 
you in such a hurry that you couldn't wait even 
over Sunday to force your damaged goods upon 
the United States? Is it an excess of patriotism 
that brings you here day after day in this way 
or only your realization of our necessities?" 

"Why our clients" began the lawyer. 

"Yes, I know all about your clients," burst in 
the Assistant Secretary. "I congratulate them 
on having an attorney who will do work for them 
which he woudn't have the face to do for himself. 
I should think, after having enjoyed the honors 
you have at the hands of the government, you'd 
feel a keen pride in your present occupation! 
No, I don't want any more of your old tubs. The 
one I bought yesterday is good for nothing 
except to sink somewhere in the path of the 
enemy's fleet. It will be God's mercy if she doesn't 
go down with brave men on her — men who go 
to war and risk their lives, instead of staying 
home to sell rotten hulks to the government !" 

Finally war came. The battleship Maine on 
February 15, 1898, was blown up in Havana 
Harbor and 260 American sailors were killed. 



GREAT-HEART [ 95 



Afterward a court of inquiry met to determine 
what had caused the explosion. The jury disa- 
greed. Be that as it may, the spark had been 
applied to the powder magazine. America was 
in a convulsion — its voice was for war. 

On April 20 President McKinley declared war 
on Spain. 

ROOSEVELT CHAMPIONS DEWEY 

Roosevelt had suggested that when war came 
it would be wise for the United States to seize 
the Philippine Islands, then under Spanish pos- 
session. He it was who, when the War Depart- 
ment proposed to supplant Dewey, successfully 
urged that he be retained at the Asiatic station. 
"Keep the Olympia! Provide yourself with 
coal," he cabled to Dewey at this time. 

No sooner had President McKinley declared 
war than Roosevelt sent a still more vital message 
to Dewey, ordering him to sail into the port of 
Manila and to capture or destroy the Spanish 
fleet. 

Those who, at the Cabinet meeting, scoffed at 
Roosevelt's plan for a war now remembered that 
he had advocated this very act in his programme 
and that the officer who had so splendidly cap- 
tured Manila was the very man Roosevelt had 



96 ] GREAT-HEART 



managed against strong opposition to keep on 
the job. 

Roosevelt's reputation as a picker of men was 
further illustrated at this time by the interest he 
took in Lieutenant Sims, then American naval 
attache at Paris. 

Sims had written to his superiors letter after 
letter pointing out how backward our fleet was 
in marksmanship. He had definite plans for 
teaching Yankee sailors how to shoot. Those in 
authority considered Sims an alarmist, but 
Roosevelt grew concerned as he noted the small 
proportion of hits to shots made by our ships. He 
then sounded the slogan that "the shots that hit 
are the shots that count." 

Roosevelt could do little then in support of 
Sims, but when he became President he remem- 
bered Sims and appointed him to lead in revolu- 
tionizing the fleet's training in marksmanship. 
It was due to Sims — now the admiral who has 
served this country so well in the present war — 
that the fighting efficiency of the navy, as far as 
gunnery went, became three times more effective. 

The following account and appreciation of 
Admiral Dewey's work derives a special interest 
from the fact that it was written by Colonel 
Roosevelt shortly after the battle of Manila: 




ROOSEVELT ADnRESSING AX INTERESTED ArDIEXCE 



GREAT-HEART [ 97 



"Admiral Dewey was sent to command the 
fleet on the Asiatic station primarily because he 
had such a record in the past that the best officers 
in the navy believed him to be peculiarly a man 
of the fighting temperament and fit to meet 
emergencies, and because he had shown his wil- 
lingness to assume heavy responsibilities. 

"For our own sakes, and in particular for the 
sake of any naval officer who in the future may be 
called upon to do such a piece of work as Dewey 
did, let us keep in mind the further fact that he 
could not have accomplished his feat if he had 
not had first-class vessels and excellently trained 
men; if his warships had not been so good and 
his captains and crews such thorough masters of 
their art. 

"A man of less daring courage than Dewey 
would never have done what he did; but the 
courage itself was not enough. The Spaniards, 
too, had courage. What they lacked was energy, 
training, forethought. They fought their vessels 
until they burned or sank; but their gunnery 
was so poor that they did not kill a man in the 
American fleet. Even Dewey's splendid capacity 
would not have enabled him to win the battle of 
Manila Bay had it not been for the traditional 
energy and seamanship of our naval service, so 

TB8 



98 ] GREAT-HEART 



well illustrated in his captains, and the excellent 
gun practice of the crews, the result of years of 
steady training." 

Roosevelt never lost his interest in the navy. 
Admiral Chadwick wrote a book on the early 
period of the American navy. As soon as the 
book was published Senator Lodge hurried to 
the White House, hoping to surprise Mr. Roose- 
velt with the news of the publication. 

"I see," he remarked, "that Admiral Chad- 
wick has written a book on the American navy." 

"Yes," broke in Roosevelt, "I have read it. 
It's bully. I didn't think Chadwick was equal 
to it." 

Roosevelt felt that his work for the navy was 
done at the outbreak of the war. 

"I have nothing more to do," he said. "I must 
go to war myself." 

He was urged to keep his position. The women 
of the Cabinet reminded him that he had six 
children. 

"I have done what I could to bring about the 
war," he said; "now I have no right to ask others 
to fight it out while I stay home." 

He resigned to go to the front. 



VIII 

Roosevelt's Rough Riders 

WHEN America went to war with Germany 
she was in her typical state of unprepared- 
ness. In spite of her handicaps, the world admits 
that she did her tremendous job efficiently. 
The same state of confusion and unprepared- 
ness existed when America went to war with 
Spain. The thing that saved the day in both 
cases was the latent fighting strength of the 
nation. At the beginning of the Spanish war, 
just as at the beginning of the war with Germany, 
the young men thronged the enlistment centers. 
Regiments and ships were besieged with appli- 
cants. Men who had deserted in peace times 
returned, begging for a chance to fight. 

ROOSEVELT AND WOOD 

Typical examples of this true American spirit 
were Theodore Roosevelt and his comrade, Army 
Surgeon Leonard Wood. Roosevelt saw in Wood 
a man after his own heart. Wood traced his 
ancestry back to the "Mayflower"; he was directly 
descended from Susanna AVliite, whose son, Pere- 
grine White, was the first white child born in 
New England. Wood was born at Winchester, 

[99] 



100 ] GREAT-HEART 



New Hampshire, on October 9, 1860. His father 
was Dr. Charles Jewett Wood, who followed the 
profession of a country doctor. The boy Leonard 
went to the district school and later attended an 
old-fashioned academy at Middleboro. 

Upon the death of his father in 1880, Wood 
entered the Harvard Medical School. When he 
graduated he became an intern at the Boston 
City Hospital. At twenty-four he began the 
practice of medicine in Staniford Street, Boston. 
He was located in a poor neighborhood and had 
all he could do to make ends meet. 

In 1885 he took an examination for admission 
as a surgeon in the army. He passed second in 
a competitive class of fifty-nine. His first ser- 
vice was at Fort Warren, Massachusetts. From 
this post he was ordered to Arizona. Here he 
met Captain H. L. Lawton of the Fourth Cav- 
alry, who later became Major-General Lawton. 
The two fought Apaches together. Wood devel- 
oped into such a good fighting man that before 
he had been commissioned three months, and 
while he still held the rank of surgeon, he was 
given the command of the infantry of the expe- 
dition. 

While engaged in this work he announced his 
opinion that a well-trained white man could en- 



GREAT- HEART [101 



dure more than an Indian. It became his ambi- 
tion to prove this so far as he himself was 
concerned. 

General Miles, in forwarding to the War De- 
partment his report of Captain Lawton's expe- 
dition against Geronimo, had this to say of 
Wood: 

"He not only fulfilled the duties of his pro- 
fession in his skillful attention to disabled officers 
and soldiers, but at times performed satisfactorily 
the duties of a line officer, and, during the whole 
extraordinary march, by his example of ph57^sical 
endurance, greatly encouraged others, having 
voluntarily made many of the longest and most 
difficult marches on foot." 

After service in Mexico, Los Angeles, New 
Mexico and other posts. General Wood was 
ordered to duty as an army surgeon in Wash- 
ington in 1895. He became a filend of President 
Cleveland and his family, and later received a 
summons from President McKinley to become 
the regular medical adviser to Mrs. McKinley 
and himself. It was at this time that he met 
Roosevelt, then Assistant Secretary of the Navy. 
Their first meeting occurred when they were 
guests at dinner of the Lowndes family. They 
were at once attracted to each other. They pos- 



102 ] GREAT-HEART 

sessed the same ideals. They went tramping 
together, ran foot races, scaled steep hills, crossed 
log bridges and did anything that would increase 
their strength and endurance. 

When the talk of war with Spain arose, the 
two men became so eager to see active service 
that President McKinley, who was a close friend 
to both Wood and Roosevelt, called them "The 
War Party." When Wood visited McKinley, 
the latter would ask: "Have you and Theodore 
declared war yet?" 

General Alger, to whom Wood was also medi- 
cal adviser, was heartily in favor of the "Rough 
Rider" regiment, and when Wood was commis- 
sioned to raise the regiment and appointed its 
Colonel, General Alger gave him a desk in his 
office with the injunction: "Now don't let me 
hear from you again until your regiment is 
raised!" 

In the campaign that followed, Roosevelt tes- 
tified in regard to Wood: 

"No soldier could outwalk him, could live with 
greater indifference on hard and scanty fare, 
could endure hardship better or do better without 
sleep." Others who served under Wood testified 
that he went through a hail of bullets without 
fear, that he would walk erect along the line when 



GREAT- HEART [103 



his soldiers were hugging the ground, and that 
he would calmly caution his men: "Don't swear, 
men. Shoot I" 

General Wood's work as governor of San- 
tiago, and later as governor of the whole island 
of Cuba, and his still later efforts shoulder to 
shoulder with Roosevelt to arouse America's 
conscience and to make the American army an 
efficient fighting force, is well known to the 
American public. 

Roosevelt himself, having publicly expressed 
the opinion that it was the duty of the United 
States to free Cuba, was intensely eager to back 
up his words by deeds. The berserker strain in 
his blood would not permit him to stay at home. 

Having submitted his resignation as Assistant 
Secretary of the Navy on April 16, Roosevelt 
applied for an appointment on General Fitzhugh 
Lee's staff. However, a greater opportunity 
arose. Congress had authorized the raising of 
three national volunteer cavalry regiments that 
were to act independently of the state troops. 
Secretary of War Alger offered Roosevelt the 
command of one of these regiments. Roosevelt 
had had four years; membership in the 8th Regi- 
ment of the New York State National Guard 
and had risen to the rank of captain. This was a 



104 ] GREAT-HEART 



basis for his military career. He told Alger that j 
after six weeks' service in the field he felt that he 1 
would be competent to handle the regiment, but 
that he would not know how to equip it or how to 
get it ready for the first action. He recommended 
that Wood be given the command, and that he be 
allowed to serve under him. Alger laughed at 
his modesty, but the matter ended with Wood 
being appointed colonel of the regiment while 
Roosevelt became lieutenant-colonel. The regi- 
ment was called the 1st United States Volunteer 
Cavalry, but the public soon nicknamed it 
"Roosevelt's Rough Riders." 

This regiment was to be raised from the states 
of Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas. 
It was at first limited to 780 men. Later the 
number was raised to 1,000. Strong and 
picturesque was the company that composed the 
contingent. 

During Roosevelt's stay on his ranch in Dakota 
he had learned to value the plainsmen as men of 
great courage and resistance, with bodies in splen- 
did condition for undergoing the hardships of | 
war. They were skilled horsemen; they knew 






how to use their guns, and they were therefore 
ideal material for the cavalry. Roosevelt called 
to them and they came. Along with these cow- 



GREAT- HEART [ 105 



boys flocked hunters from the backwoods, trap- 
pers from the Rockies, Indian fighters and even 
redskins themselves. Prominent young clubmen 
of New York and Boston; students of Harvard, 
Yale, Princeton and other universities; police- 
men who had served under Roosevelt on the New 
York police force clamored for places in the regi- 
ment. No men were taken, however, until they 
proved that they possessed ability as horsemen, 
that they were skilled in the use of the rifle and 
that they were physically able to endure a strenu- 
ous campaign. 

The officers were generally selected from men 
who had been in the regular army, who, having 
fought against the Apache or the Cheyenne, had 
ended their terms of service and settled in the 
Southwest. Other officers were recruited from the 
ranks of sheriffs and deputy sheriffs, marshals 
and deputy marshals — men who had waged un- 
ceasing warfare against bad Indians or white 
desperadoes. 

The men in the ranks had careers just as 
adventurous. Some had typical Western names: 
Cherokee Bill, Happy Jack of Arizona, Bronco 
Buster, Smoky Moore and Rattlesnake Pete. 
Professional gamblers mingled with Baptist or 
Methodist clergymen to the enlightenment of 



106 ] GREAT-HEART 



each. One of the gamest fighters was a full- 
blooded Pawnee named Pollock. Another was 
a Cherokee. 

Some one called the regiment "Roosevelt's 
Rough Riders." The name caught the public's 
fancy. It spread from coast to coast and made 
Roosevelt's name a household word. 

Roosevelt had his work cut out for him in weld- 
ing the various elements under him into a disci- 
plined imit. He measured fully up to his task. No 
man was better equipped than he for such a com- 
mand. In roundups in the Far West, in hunting 
expeditions, in the political districts of New York, 
City, in clubs and drawing-rooms and in official 
circles he had met all sorts and conditions of 
men. He knew how to talk with each class in its 
own language. He knew how to be friendly and 
intimate, yet at the same time to keep his dignity 
and their respect. The men began to obey orders 
and assume the military manner in a way that 
aroused their officers' warmest commendation. 
They comprehended that without discipline they 
would be a mere mob, dangerous to themselves 
and to their country, and, however tiresome were 
the drills and tactics, they performed them 
quickly and efficiently. 

The relations between officers and men were 



GKEAT-HEART [107 



democratic and friendly, suggesting the relations 
of our officers and privates during the present 
war. The Colonel, in his book, "The Rough 
Riders," gives several instances of this. 

Holderman, the cook, announced dinner to the 
Colonel and three majors in this way: "If you 
fellows don't come soon everything'll get cold." 

No one rebuked him. A sentinel who had just 
mastered the manual of arms saluted with great 
pride as Roosevelt passed ; then he added heartily : 

"Good evening, Colonel!" This breach of mili- 
tary etiquette the Colonel found it wise to over- 
look. 

Another sentinel, when mosquitoes were bad, 
slapped at them vigorously, with this side remark 
to the Colonel: 

"Ain't they bad?" 

"That they are!" returned Roosevelt, slapping 
away in his turn. 

The horses for the regiment were brought from 
the Western ranges. Some of them were so wild 
that the men were compelled to throw them down 
and tie them before they could be shod. Others 
bucked their riders. The regiment, however, was 
not lacking in men who knew how to tame and 
handle rebellious broncos, and the splendid horse- 
manship of the riders resulted in them making 



108 ] GREAT-HEART 



their horses perform each maneuver with speed 
and accuracy. However vicious or restless a 
horse might be, his rider would force him to stay 
in line. Naturally, such horsemen and such horses 
gave the regiment an appearance of dash and ease 
that excited the admiration of all who saw the 
skirmish drills. 

Colonel Roosevelt's own mounts came from 
Texas. While the price paid for them was only 
$50 each — ridiculously low compared to the high 
price of horseflesh during the world war — they 
proved tough and hardy and rendered Roosevelt 
excellent service. 

Colonel Wood and Lieutenant-Colonel Roose- 
velt were anxious to get their men to the firing 
line. They knew the regular army would have 
the most difficult work, and their object was to 
train and equip their regiment so that its fighting 
efficiency would gain it a place at the very front. 
Finally marching orders came. The men cheered 
and were off. 

A big disappointment — though of a minor 
nature so far as military affairs were concerned — 
was in store for them. A pity it is to narrate 
that this body of men were not allowed to show 
their prowess as horsemen. It developed that, 
after all, the men were not to be used as mounted 



GREAT-HEART [ 109 



soldiers. The blow was an especially hard one to 
Roosevelt, who had trained his men in shock tac- 
tics for use against hostile cavalry. The decision 
was also a trying one for some of the men who 
were more at home in the saddle than on foot. 

However, ^-he men took the order like good 
soldiers, and in slouch hats, blue flannel shirts, 
brown trousers, leggings and boots, with hand- 
kerchiefs knotted around their throats, they 
marched off on the first step of their journey to 
Cuba. 



IX 



Campaigning in Cuba 

THE Rough Riders, as they left their Texas 
encampment for Tampa, Fla., their point 
of embarkation for Cuba, humorously changed 
their nickname to "Wood's Weary Walkers," 
a title that, through their long marches in the 
jungles of Cuba, came to have more truth than 
humor in it. 

Viewing the Spanish campaign in the light of 
the world war, it will be seen that there is a strik- 
ing similarity between this regiment and the 
French Foreign Legion. This parallel is true not 
only of the personnel of the contingent, which 
included adventurous spirits from all sections of 
the country, but also of the fighting spirit of the 
men. 

How to reach the fighting field was the biggest 
question that confronted the Rough Riders. They 
were among the very last to receive permission 
to go, and if it had not been for Roosevelt's 
dogged determination they would probably have 
been left behind. Even when orders came to en- 
train for Tampa transportation was refused. 
Roosevelt, however, was equal to the emergency. 
He jumped aboard the engine of a coal train and 

[110] 



GREAT-HEART [111 



demanded of its crew that they transport his men. 
The crew obeyed orders. The regiment reached 
Tampa covered with coal dust. 

At Tampa the Rough Riders found themselves 
without an official assignment to a transport. 
Nothing daunted, Roosevelt moved his men im- 
mediately on board the nearest vessel. 

When the landing place in Cuba was reached 
the Colonel got his men ashore among the first 
and soon after landing began his march to the 
front. 

While Roosevelt's picturesque personality led 
to his figuring largely in the newspaper accounts 
of the war, yet in all of these movements he was 
in close association with Colonel Wood. The two 
worked together as one man. While the men had 
been intimate before, it was in this campaign that 
the friendship was welded that was to last and 
deepen until death ended it. 

Later in the campaign Colonel Wood was 
promoted to the rank of general and Lieutenant- 
Colonel Roosevelt become colonel. 

The corps to which the Rough Riders were 
attached was under the command of Major-Gen- 
eral Shafter. Major- General Wheeler, a veteran 
of the Civil War and a dashing cavalry leader, 
commanded the cavalry. Under the latter, as 



112 ] GREAT- HEART 



commander of the 2d Brigade, was Brigadier- 
General Young. Young's brigade was composed 
of the 1st and 10th regiments of cavalry. The 
10th regiment was composed of negroes and the 
1st Regiment of the Rough Riders. 

General Wheeler was anxious to strike the first 
blow with his cavalry and while Brigadier- Gen- 
eral Lawton, who commanded the infantry, was 
protecting the landing from the enemy, General 
Wheeler ordered General Young to advance 
early in the morning from the little village of 
Siboney toward Santiago and to attack the enemy 
wherever he was found. The Rough Riders 
were included in this advance. 

Two roads about a mile apart, lead from 
Siboney to Santiago. General Young advanced 
on the eastern road and directed Wood and 
Roosevelt to take the western road, which led 
over the mountains. The two roads drew together 
near the village of Las Guasimas. Here the two 
commands were to meet. 

On the march from the landing place inland 
the troops traveled over rugged hills, covered for 
the most part by dense jungles. They camped 
on a dusty, brush-covered flat, with jungle on 
one side and a disease-breeding pool, fringed with 
palm trees, on the other side. The baggage had 




before the battle of san juan. roosevelt on the 

extreme right, colonel wood in center. to the 

left: major dunn, colonel brodie and 

chaplain buown, with general wheeler 

in the foreground 



I 



GREAT-HEART [113 



not yet come ashore, and the soldiers had only 
what food they carried with them. Roosevelt's 
equipment consisted of a raincoat and a tooth- 
brush. 

They meet hundreds of Cuban insurgents — 
tattered crews armed with all sorts of weapons, 
all of which were in poor condition. 

FIGHTING AT LAS GUASIMAS 

When the Rough Riders reached the scene of 
action they had first to climb a very steep hill. 
They went into action with less than five hundred 
men. 

Captain Capron's troop was in the lead, fol- 
lowed by Colonel Wood. Roosevelt rode close 
behind them at the head of the other three troops 
of his squadron. The trail was ^o narrow that at 
many places the men had to march in single file. 
At other times they had to force their way 
through dense, tangled jungles. After marching 
for over an hour they came to a halt, but Colonel 
Wood announced that the advance guard had 
come upon a Spanish outpost. 

A minute later Wood gave Roosevelt orders 
to deploy three troops to the right of the trail and 
advance. A roar in front of them soon announced 
that the fight was on. 



TR9 



114 ] GREAT-HEART 



Roosevelt and his officers were searching for 
the place from which the smokeless powder of 
the Spaniards was pouring Mauser bullets upon 
his men. 

It was the famous war correspondent, Richard 
Harding Davis, who first showed Roosevelt's men 
where to direct their fire. He had accompanied 
the Rough Riders and had taken a place at the 
extreme front of the line, from which place he 
spotted with his glasses the exact location of the 
Spaniards. 

"There they are, Colonel!" he suddenly cried. 
"Look! Over there! I can see their heads near 
that glade!" 

Roosevelt looked across the valley where Davis 
was pointing. He, too, discovered the heads of 
the Spanish soldiers and directed his sharp- 
shooters to fire on them. 

The Spaniards sprang out of the cover and 
ran to another spot. The shots of the Americans 
had told. The Spaniards continued to retreat. 
The Rough Riders and the other troops pursued. 
They were forced to leave the wounded in the 
jungle where they fell. 

Harry Hefner of G Troop, fell mortally 
wounded in the hip. Two of his companions 
dragged him behind a tree. He propped himself 



GREAT-HEART [115 



up and asked for his canteen and his rifle. He 
then resumed shooting, and continued firing until 
he died. 

Roland, a New Mexican cow-puncher, fought 
beside Roosevelt. The Colonel noticed blood issu^ 
ing from his side and ordered the trooper to go to 
the rear. Roland grumbled, but went back. Fif- 
teen minutes later he was on the firing line again. 
He told the Colonel that he could not find the 
hospital. Roosevelt doubted it, but let him stay 
until the end of the fight, when it was discovered 
that a bullet had broken one of his ribs. 

When the scrimmage began some of the men 
began to curse. "Don't swear — shoot!" Wood 
growled at them. 

Toward the end of the engagement Roosevelt 
was falsely informed that Wood had been killed. 
The command of the regiment for the time being 
devolved upon the Colonel. He started to lead 
his men toward the main body, but met Wood 
himself, who told him that the fight was over and 
that the Spaniards had retreated. 

In this first scrimmage the Rough Riders lost 
eight men killed and thirty-four wounded. They 
had taken a Spanish fort, defended by more than 
twelve hundred men, and had won from them 
complete possession of the entire Spanish 
position. 



116 ] GREAT-HEART 



THE CAPTURE OF KETTLE HILL 

Next came the historic battle of San Juan. 
When news of the battle reached General Shaf ter 
he was told that the Americans had been cut to 
pieces. It was also said that the regiment had 
passed the advanced outpost without orders. 
Shafter exploded. 

"I will send that damned cowboy regiment," 
he said, "so far to the rear that it will not get 
another chance." 

Later, however, came the news that the cow- 
boys had been victorious, so Shafter wrote a flat- 
tering letter to Roosevelt, in command, congratu- 
lating him on the success of his attack. 

There followed a period of inaction. Then the 
Rough Riders received orders to proceed against 
Santiago. 

The regiment struck camp and marched to the 
front behind the 1st and 10th Cavalry. Every 
man carried three days' rations. 

Roosevelt's command joined General Wood 
at El Paso Hill and camped for the night. 

The next morning it was announced that the 
main fighting against Santiago was to be done 
by Lawton's infantry division, which was ordered 
to take El Caney, while the Rough Riders were 



GREAT- HEART [117 



ordered simply to make a diversion with artillery. 

When the firing began shrapnel shells exploded 
over Roosevelt's head. One of the shrapnel bul- 
lets struck his wrist. The same shell wounded 
four men of his regiment. He at once led his 
men from their exposed position into the under- 
brush. 

General Wood then ordered Roosevelt to fol- 
low behind the 1st Brigade, and the Rough 
Riders began a march toward the ford of the 
San Juan River. They reached the ford and 
crossed it. In front of them was a rise of ground, 
afterward called Kettle Hill. Roosevelt found 
the 1st Brigade engaged in a hot battle, so he 
halted his men and sent back word for orders. 

On top of Kettle Hill were large haciendas, 
or ranch buildings. The Spaniards, from their 
stations on the hills, poured a heavy fire on the 
American troops, who were hidden in sheltered 
lanes and along the edge of the San Juan River, 
or in patches of jungle grass. Roosevelt, lying 
with his troops under this severe fire, sent mes- 
senger after messenger to General Sumner or 
General Wood to secure permission to advance. 
He had about determined to go ahead when Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Dorst rode up with the command 
to "move forward and support the regulars in 



118 ] GREAT-HEART 



the assault on the hills in front." The impatient 
Roosevelt leaped upon his horse. He had intended 
to go into action on foot, but he saw that he would 
be unable to run up and down the line and super- 
intend matters if he were on foot. His men went 
eagerly to the attack. The Colonel started in the 
rear of his men, as was the custom for a Colonel, 
but his ardor soon bore him to the head of the 
regiment. 

As he rode down the line he saw a slacker hid- 
den behind a little bush. To urge the soldier for- 
ward he called: 

"Are you afraid to stand up while I am on 
horseback?" 

While Roosevelt was speaking, a bullet, evi- 
dently aimed at him, struck and killed the man 
who was hiding. 

There has been much discussion as whether 
Roosevelt exceeded his authority in the capture 
of Kettle Hill. In reviewing the matter it is best 
to take the Colonel's own account of what hap- 
pened. In his book "The Rough Riders" he thus 
describes the charge: 

"By the time I had come to the head of the 
regiment we ran into the left wing of the 9th 
Regulars, and some of the 1st Regulars, who 
were lying down while the officers were walking 



GREAT-HEART [119 



to and fro. The officers of the white and colored 
regiments ahke took the greatest pride in seeing 
that the men more than did their duty; and the 
mortahty among them was great. 

"I spoke to the captain in command of the rear 
platoons, saying that I had been ordered to sup- 
port the regulars in the attack upon the hills, and 
that in my judgment we could not take these hills 
by firing at them, and that we must rush them. 
He answered that his orders were to keep his 
men lying where they were, and that he could not 
charge without order. I asked where the colonel 
was, and, as he was not in sight, said: 'Then I 
am the ranking ofiicer here and I give the order 
to charge,' for I did not want to keep the men 
longer in the open suffering under a fire which 
they could not effectively return. 

"Naturally, the captain hesitated to obey this 
order when no word had been received from his 
own colonel. So I said: 'Then let my men 
through, sir,' and rode on through the lines, fol- 
lowed by the grinning Rough Riders, whose 
attention had been completely taken off the Span- 
ish bullets, partly by my dialogue with the regu- 
lars and partly by the language I had been using 
to themselves as I got the lines forward, for I 
had been joking with some and swearing at 



120 ] GREAT-HEAUT 



others, as the exigencies of the case seemed to 
demand. 

"When I got to where the head of the left 
wing of the 9th was lying, through the courtesy 
of Lieutenant Hartwick, two of whose colored 
troopers threw down the fence, I was enabled to 
get back into the lane, at the same time waving my 
hat and giving the order to charge the hill on our 
right front. Out of my sight, over on the right, 
Captains McBlain and Taylor, of the 9th, made 
up their minds independently to charge at just 
about this time; and at almost the same moment 
Colonels Carroll and Hamilton, who were off, I 
believe, to my left, where we could see neither 
them nor their men, gave the order to advance. 
But of all this I knew nothing at the time. The 
whole line, tired of waiting and eager to close 
with the enemy, was straining to go forward; 
and it seems that different parts slipped 
the leash at almost the same moment. The 1st 
Cavalry came up the hill just behind, and partly 
mixed with my regiment and the 9th. As already 
said, portions of the 3d, 6th and 10th followed, 
while the rest of the members of these three regi- 
ments kept more in touch with the infantry on 
our left." 

Roosevelt, at the head of his cheering, firing 



GREAT- HEART [121 



men, galloped toward the hill. Forty yards from 
the top he ran into a wire fence and was forced 
to dismount from his horse, Little Texas, and 
turn it loose. 

The Spaniards fled from the ranch buildings 
as the Americans approached, and soon the hill 
was covered with Rough Riders and the colored 
troopers of the 9th, with some men from the 1st. 
On the top of the hill was a huge iron kettle, used 
probably for sugar refining. From this big pot 
the battle derived its name of Kettle Hill. 

THE FAMOUS "ROUND ROBIN" 

Having aided materially in the capture of 
Kettle Hill, Roosevelt and his men looked toward 
their left, to where the Spaniards were fighting 
in the trenches under the San Juan blockhouse. 
General Hawkins' brigade was storming this 
blockhouse and soon captured it. When the 
blockhouse fell the Colonel ordered a charge to 
a line of hills still further on. 

Only four men started with him. Three of 
these were shot. Roosevelt gave one of the 
wounded his canteen of water and ran back to 
find out why the other soldiers had not followed. 
He found that nobody had heard his orders. 

By this time General Sumner had come up and 



122 ] GREAT- HEART 



Roosevelt asked of him permission to lead the 
charge. Sumner gave his consent and the Rough 
Riders stormed the Spanish entrenchment. There 
was close fighting, which resulted in the taking of 
a few prisoners, and what was more important 
to the men, the capture of Spanish provisions. 

Later in the day the Spaniards counter- 
attacked. The Rough Riders were glad of the 
chance to fight in the open, and drove back the 
Spaniards with laughter and cheers. During this 
fight Roosevelt was the highest officer in com- 
mand at his part of the front. 

A rumor went around that the men were to 
be ordered to fall back. That evening after the 
fight. General Wheeler visited the front and told 
Roosevelt to keep himself in readiness to fall 
back if necessary. Roosevelt answered: 

"Well, general, I really don't know whether 
we would obey an order to fall back. We can take 
that city by a rush and if we have to move out of 
here at all I should be inclined to make the rush i 
in the right direction." 

General Wheeler thought for a moment, then 
he expressed his hearty agreement with the Col- 
onel's sentiments and promised that there would 
be no falling back. Wheeler had been ill for a 
couple of days, but like the old gamecock he was, 



GREAT- HEART [123 



lie had managed to take a strong part in the fight. 

It was the opinion of the Rough Riders that 
if there had been one in high command to press 
the attack that afternoon the Americans would 
have gone right into Santiago. 

The next day the battle became a siege and 
most of the fighting was done from trench works. 
The flag of truce was sent to demand the surren- 
der of the city. Each day thereafter the soldiers 
expected to see Santiago surrendered, and what- 
ever fighting was done was of a minor nature. 

During the truce certain military attaches and 
foreign officers came out to visit the Rough 
Riders. Interesting, in view of the warm relations 
between Britain and America during the world 
war, was the incident that happened when Prince 
X, a Russian .visited Roosevelt. The Colonel 
introduced him to one of the regular army offi- 
cers, a splendid fellow, who yet viewed foreign 
relations from a strictly mid- Western viewpoint. 
Roosevelt overheard him remark to the Russian, 
whom he called "Prince" as familiarly as a Ken- 
tuckian called his neighbor "colonel": 

"You see, prince, the great result of this war 
is that it has united the two branches of the 
Anglo-Saxon people; and now that they are to- 
gether they can whip the world, prince ! They can 
whip the world!" 



124 ] GREAT-HEART 



Other army officers, who had not received the 
training in diplomacy and international relation- 
ship that our American officers have received in 
the late conflict, had the habit of grouping all of 
these foreign attaches under the title of "Dutch- 
men." 

When this same Russian was making his fare- 
well round, a general shook hands with him 
heartily, with this parting remark: 

"Well, goodby; sorry you are going. Which 
are you anyhow — a German or a Russian?" 

On the 17th of July, Santiago formally sur- 
rendered, and the Rough Riders with the rest of 
the army were drawn up beside their trenches. 
The American flag was hoisted, the trumpets 
sounded and the men cheered. Their fighting was 
over. 

After the siege, the army officers in Washing- 
ton proposed to keep the army stationed around 
Santiago. General Shafter tried his best to have 
the army ordered home. The health of the troops 
was becoming very bad. Yellow fever and mala- 
rial fever had attacked them. If the soldiers 
remained it is possible that at least one-half of 
them would have died or have become invalided. 

General Shafter's attempts failed and at last 
he called a council of his commanders and general 



GREAT-HEART [125 



medical officers and consulted them in the matter. 

Roosevelt, while he had command of a brigade, 
was only a colonel and did not mean to attend the 
conference, but General Shafter sent word to him 
that he was wanted particularly, and he went. 

The general explained to his officers that he 
could not get the War Department to appreciate 
their situation and that the public itself was ignor- 
ant of the ravages disease was making upon their 
ranks. He felt that there should be some 
announcement issued which would make the War 
Department take action before most of the men 
were down with sickness. 

At this point General Shafter sought Roose- 
velt's assistance. He explained to him that as he 
was a volunteer officer, about to return imme- 
diately to civil life, he could afford to take risks 
which regular army men could not afford to take 
Therefore, he suggested that the Colonel write 
a letter or make a statement appealing for a with- 
drawal of the army from the fever holes of Cuba. 

Roosevelt left the meeting with the under- 
standing that he would give an interview on the 
subject to the press. General Wood, however, 
hinted to him that it would be better to put his 
statement in the form of a letter to General 
Shafter. This Roosevelt did. Then he presented 



126 ] GREAT-HEART 



the letter to General Shafter, who waved it away 
and said: 

"I don't want to take it; do what you wish 
with it r 

The Colonel, however, persisted in handing it 
to him. Shafter, thereupon, shoved the letter 
towards the correspondent of The Associated 
Press, who grabbed it, thereby releasing Roose- 
velt's hold. 

Gaining courage by this action, the rest of the 
officers united in a "round-robin" to General 
Shafter. This document was dictated by General 
Wood, who being a surgeon, keenly realized the 
need of removing the men from their pestilential 
quarters, and was signed by Generals Kent, 
Bates, Chaffee, Sumner, Ludlow, Ames, Wood 
and by Roosevelt himself. 

The Associated Press representative was anx- 
ious to secure a copy of this letter, but Wood told 
him it was impossible for him to have it or see it. 

Wood then went to General Shafter, handed 
him the paper and said: 

"The matter is now in your hands." 

Shafter said: "I don't care whether this gentle- 
man has it or not," referring to The Associated 
Press correspondent. 

The Associated Press representative then 



GREAT- HEART [127 



secured a copy of the dispatch and thus the affair 
became pubhc. The result of this publicity 
became immediately felt. Within three days the 
army received orders to prepare to sail for home. 

On August 7 the Rough Riders embarked on 
the transport Miamee. At last the transport 
sighted the Long Island coast, and late on the 
afternoon of the 14th it entered the waters of 
the Sound and cast anchor at Montauk Point. 

The Rough Riders stood by their Colonel to 
the man. In the United States disparaging 
remarks had been made about the Colonel and 
his regiment. Some of the officials in Washing- 
ton, angered at his criticisms of the canned beef 
and the short supplies sent to the men, took occa- 
sion to sneer at his campaign. 

In the jungles of Cuba, however, the Rough 
Riders saw Roosevelt in his true light. He looked 
after their comfort and well-being. He sympa- 
thized with them in their predicaments. He 
understood them and helped them out of many 
difficulties. When they broke rules he was as 
merciful to them as it was possible to be, and 
whatever attitude he assumed toward them was 
felt by them to be for their own good. 

These were times when battles were won, not 
by the side that had the greatest amount of shells 



128 ] GREAT- HEART 



and shock troops, but by those who displayed a 
personal bravery, and Roosevelt fought in such 
a gallant manner that those who had accused him 
of enlisting for personal motives soon grew 
ashamed of their spitefulness. 

Roosevelt was not given to profanity, but 
when there came times when a soldier could only 
be handled by the use of language he knew, the 
Colonel did not balk at using that language. It 
is said of him that he once confessed to another 
officer in a repentant manner: "I swore today." 

Then he made this explanation: 

"A captain riding off in cool disregard of 
orders is enough to make the sweetest-tempered 
archangel use 'language.' What I said, or rather 

bellowed was: 'What in are you doing? 

Good , wheel into line !' What I might have 

said was : 'Really, my dear sir, do you not observe 
that you are acting in direct opposition to my 
instructions ? I beg that you will not march your 
troop into Kamchatka.' Well, one always thinks 
afterward of what one might have said." 

It is interesting to note that the original idea 
for a regiment such as the Rough Riders was 
suggested to Roosevelt several years before the 
Spanish War by no other man that Baron von 
Sternburg of the German Embassy. The baron, 




HALL AT SAGAMORE HILL 



I 



GREAT-HEART [ 129 



when only seventeen, had served in the Franco- 
Prussian War as a hussar. There was no war 
with Germany on the American horizon in those 
days and the baron spent a week in camp at 
Montauk with the Rough Riders upon their 
return. 

On the Sunday before the regiment disbanded 
at Montauk, there came an occasion of genuine 
surprise to the Colonel. He was asked out of his 
tent by Lieutenant-Colonel Brodie and found 
the whole regiment formed in a hallow square. 
"When he entered the square one of the men 
stepped forward and presented him with a splen- 
did bronze of Remington's "The Bronco Buster.*' 
Roosevelt was deeply touched and deeply appre- 
ciative of this very appropriate gift. After the 
presentation the men filed past and Roosevelt 
shook hands with each and bade him farewell. 

The next morning the men scattered to their 
homes. Some went North and South. Some 
went to the great cities of the East. Some turned 
to the plains, the mountains and the deserts. 

The straight-from-the-shoulder sermon the 
Colonel preached to his Rough Riders as they 
went out to resume their citizen occupations was 
one that made a permanent impression upon their 
lives. 

TRIO 



130 ] GREAT-HEART 



"Get action; do things; be sane," he said to 
them, "don't flitter away your time; create; act; 
take a place wherever you are and be somebody!" 

Through the remainder of his historic career 
the Colonel never reached too great a place to be 
out of touch with his Rough Riders, no matter 
what humble positions they held. No member of 
the regiment ever came to the White House to 
see his former chief without Roosevelt breaking 
all engagements to shake his hand and talk over 
with him the stirring events in Cuba. 

It is said that when Senator Shelby M. Cul- 
lom, of Illinois, went to call on President 
Roosevelt and was forced to wait before he could 
get in to see him he asked of the doorkeeper: 
"Who is in there?" 

"A former Rough Rider," was the reply. 

"Then," queried Cullom, "what chance have I, 
merely a Senator?" 

He turned away, promising to return at a time 
when he would not have to compete with such 
an attraction. 

Roosevelt's experience during the Cuban cam- 
paign made him deeply sympathetic with the lot 
of the soldier. This was in evidence when, while 
he was President, our army was engaged in com- 
bating the guerilla warfare in the Philippines. An 



GKEAT-IIEART [131 



order was then issued by the War Department 
that while the names of officers killed should be 
reported by cable, only the numbers of privates 
fallen should be sent. 

The press of the country announced that a 
certain regiment had been engaged in battle. 
The War Department was besieged by the 
parents of the soldiers for information, but no 
news as to who were killed or wounded came 
imtil the lists arrived by mail. 

President Roosevelt was at Sagamore Hill 
when the facts were reported to him. General 
Corbin was present. He asked the general what 
the order meant. The general told him that it 
had been issued for the purpose of economy, that 
each officer had a symbol in the cable code, but 
that to transmit the name and regiment of each 
private would cost $25 or more for each man. 
When this explanation had been made Roosevelt 
said: 

"Corbin, can you telegraph from here to the 
Philippines?" 

The general said that he could and suggested 
that he be allowed to do so when he returned from 
Washington. 

"No," said Roosevelt, "we cannot wait. Send 
the order to have the names telegraphed at once. 



132 ] GREAT-HEART 



Those mothers gave the best they had to their 
country. We will not have them breaking their 
hearts for $25 or $50." 

Now that the world war is over and the ques- 
tion of whether the United States is to depend 
on volunteer military organization or on regular 
armies has been definitely settled in favor of the 
latter view, it is well to admit that the decision 
is a wise one. A regiment like the Rough Riders 
was exceptional among volunteers. Roosevelt 
himself, in his book "The Rough Riders," makes 
this comparison between the volunteer regiment 
and the regular regiment: 

"The regiment was a wholly exceptional volun- 
teer organization, and its career cannot be taken 
as in any way a justification for the belief that 
the average volunteer regiment approaches the 
average regular regiment in point of efficiency 
until it has had many months of active service. 
In the first place, though the regular regiments 
may differ markedly among themselves, yet the 
range of variation among them is nothing like 
so wide as that among volunteer regiments, where 
at first there is no common standard at all; the 
very best being, perhaps, up to the level of the 
regulars while the very worst are no better than 
mobs, and the great bulk come in between. The 



CKEAT-IIEART [ 133 



average regular regiment is superior to the aver- 
age volunteer regiment in the physique of the 
enlisted men, who have been very carefully 
selected, who have been trained to life in the 
open, and who know how to cook and take care 
of themselves generally." 



X 

"The Great Peace-Maker 



V) 



WE HAVE dwelt in this narrative princi- 
pally upon Colonel Roosevelt's fighting 
qualities; perhaps because they are the most 
picturesque and appeal more to the imagination 
of author and public. Yet the story of Theo- 
dore Roosevelt's life would be indeed lacking if 
it did not emphasize the fact that underneath 
his philosophy of conflict for that which was right 
there lay an abiding love of peace and a desire 
for world brotherhood. 

Roosevelt's experiences taught him that in the 
era in which he lived war at times was essential 
to establish justice. He did not believe in surren- 
dering to the blusterer, or to the ruler who tried 
to overrun his neighbor's boundaries by force. 
He trained himself to be a warrior and a hunter 
because he believed that a strain of the primitive 
man was necessary to combat the too often debili- 
tating influences of modern life. 

His sons, in their manhood, became warriors 
like himself, but in their youth he trained them 
to love animals and to deal kindly with men. 
His advice to them under all circumstances was 
"Be kind!" 

[134] 



GREAT- HEART [13^5 



The man who was sneered at by his political 
foes as "The Man on Horseback" became "The 
Great Peacemaker." 

His own words form the best illustration of 
his attitude toward world amity: 

"^Vhenever on any point we come in contact 
with a foreign power, I hope that we shall always 
strive to speak courteously and respectfully of 
that foreign power. Let us make it evident that 
we intend to do justice. Then let us make it 
equally evident that we will not tolerate injustice 
being done us in return. Let us further make it 
evident that we use no words which we are not 
prepared to back up with deeds, and that while 
our speech is always moderate we are ready and 
willing to make it good. Such an attitude will 
be the surest possible guarantee of that self- 
respecting peace the attainment of which is and 
must ever be the prime aim of a self-governing 
people." 

His acts while President bore out his preach- 
ing. When The Hague Tribunal of Arbitration 
was established, a large part of the work, so far 
as this nation was concerned, fell to Roosevelt. 

When the old Alaskan boundary dispute be- 
tween Great Britain and the TJnited States arose 
again, at Roosevelt's suggestion the matter was 



136 ] GREAT-HEART 



settled for all time by a joint commission that 
met in London. This commission decided in 
favor of America. 

Another dramatic crisis arose for Roosevelt's 
solution when an American, Ion Perdicaris, and 
his English son-in-law were kidnapped from their 
home near Tangier, in Morocco, by the Moorish 
bandit, Raisuli, on May 18, 1904. The bandit 
demanded a ransom and other favors from the 
Sultan of Morocco before he would release his 
prisoners. Roosevelt ordered the U. S. S. Brook- 
lyn, Rear- Admiral Chadwick commanding, to go 
to Tangier. Admiral Jewell followed with three 
warships. British warships joined the American 
fleet. 

"Perdicaris alive or Raisuli dead!" was said 
to be the slogan that Roosevelt hurled at the 
Sultan. Whether or not he uttered it, the report 
rang like Concord's bullet around the world. 
A month later the American and Englishman 
had been released. 

Another example of Roosevelt's desire to keep 
the peace of the world was illustrated when, at 
the Easter of 1903, there occurred a massacre 
of Jews in Kishinef, Russia. The Hebrews of 
the United States were greatly aroused at the 
atrocities and besought their government to pro- 



GREAT-HEART [137 



test to the Czar against these outrages. The Rus- 
sian government sent word privately to the Euro- 
pean countries and to President Roosevelt that 
the matter was exclusively a domestic one and 
that the Russian government would not entertain 
any representations upon the subject. The Euro- 
pean governments took no further steps in the 
matter. Roosevelt, however, promised the Jews 
of the United States that he would bring their 
paper to the notice of the Czar. 

Thus a crisis had arisen. Would Russia resent 
such a move? If she refused to accept the repre- 
sentations of the United States, would that be 
considered an affront by our government? Was 
war on the horizon? 

No international troubles occurred. Though 
the Russian government refused to receive the 
memorial, the American representative at St. 
Petersburg visited the Foreign Office with a 
letter from Secretary of State Hay, which in- 
quired as to whether the Russian government 
would accept the document. This letter to the 
Russian government went on to set forth the full 
text of the memorial. The Russian Foreign 
Office agreeably accepted it. Its publication in 
the press put before the world every word of 
the petition of the American Jews. Thus Amer- 



138 ] GREAT-HEART 



ica, through Roosevelt, had spoken its opinion in 
the courts of mankind without bringing about the 
war which timid souls predicted. 

When Roosevelt became President it was his 
rule of peace that dominated our country's rela- 
tions with other powers and that prevailed in the 
new policy of territorial annexation entered upon 
in President McKinley's administration and car- 
ried forward by Roosevelt. 

He decided that Cuba should not be taken over 
by the United States. Europe expected the 
United States to annex Cuba, and many leading 
men of his own party advised that this course 
be pursued, but he determined that the little 
island should be given every opportunity to gov- 
ern itself as an independent republic. It was by 
his inspiration that the American officials who 
administered government in the Philippines, 
Porto Rico and, during the American occupancy, 
in Cuba, devoted themselves to the welfare of the 
people in a way that won the commendation of 
our sister nations. His course in this respect was 
governed by a belief that when it was necessary 
for our government to administer the affairs of 
the weaker nations under its control that gov- 
ernment should be, not for the profit of the people 
in the United States, but for the people governed. 



GKEAT-HEART [139 



Always a sincere seeker of peace, he never- 
theless exemplified in his statesmanship his motto : 
"Speak softly, but carry a big stick!" 

This was illustrated when he directed his policy 
directly athwart that of the German Kaiser. 

Those who remember the Venezuela incident 
of 1902 will recall that the German and British 
fleets thought it necessary to discipline President 
Castro. Germany, early in the proceedings, gave 
evidence that she intended to seize a point in 
Venezuelan territory and hold it in order to con- 
trol the approach to the Isthmian Canal. The 
watchful Roosevelt perceived this scheme, 
sounded out England and found that she had 
no stomach for the alliance with Wilhelm's fleet, 
and would refuse to help Germany to fight 
America if a quarrel arose over Germany's 
grasping policy. Thereupon Roosevelt sent 
Dewey to the Caribbean Sea for fleet maneuvers 
and sent word to Germany through her Ambas- 
sador that if Germany did not agree to arbitrate 
within ten days he would instruct Dewey to resist 
her taking possession of a foot of Venezuelan soil. 
This meant war, and the President knew it, but 
he held resolutely to his purpose. The ten days 
dwindled to two days, but no agreement had 
come from Germany. Six more fateful hours 



140 ] GREAT-HEART 



passed. Then Germany agreed to arbitrate. 

Thus ended a disagreeable diplomatic episode 
that foreshadowed the acts of the present Gerr 
many, but which revealed that the American 
spirit was more than a match for that of the Hun. 

The act that won for Roosevelt the enduring 
title of "the Great Peacemaker" came during 
the Russo-Japanese War. When, in February, 
1904, war was declared between Japan and 
Russia, Roosevelt showed his deep concern in 
the matter by ordering his great Secretary of 
State, John Hay, to send forth the famous Hay 
note, which asked the two combatants to respect | 
the neutrality of China, lest there should be pre- 
cipitated a still greater catastrophe. Both na- 
tions agreed to Roosevelt's request. 

Then came Roosevelt's nomination to succeed 
himself as President. He was elected by the 
greatest popular vote ever accorded a Presiden- 
tial candidate. 

Grave domestic problems pressed upon him, 
but the Russo-Japanese War continued to occupy 
the uppermost place in his thoughts. The time 
of his entering upon a new term seemed to him 
the right moment to propose to Japan and Russia 
that they declare a truce and settle their diffi- 
culties in conference. 



GREAT-HEART [141 



Japan had already suffered terribly from the 
drain upon her men and resources. Even if she 
were victorious in the conflict the chances were 
that she would lose more than she would gain. 
The same was true of Russia. 

Roosevelt met with difficulty in getting the 
two powers to agree to a common meeting place. 
Each, however, finally agreed to send represen- 
tatives to a conference at Portsmouth, N. H. 

Roosevelt received the two delegations at 
Oyster Bay on the U. S. S. Mayflower, and then 
had them conveyed by the Mayflower and another 
naval vessel from Oyster Bay to Portsmouth. 

The peace treaty was signed on September 5, 
1905, and the world acclaimed Roosevelt the 
warrior for his services in behalf of peace. 
For bringing the two nations together he was 
awarded in the following year the Nobel Peace 
Prize. This consisted of a medal and a sum of 
$40,000, which, at the time, he turned over to a 
board of trustees as a fund to be used in estab- 
lishing industrial peace. However, when the 
World War broke out, without this money hav- 
ing been expended by the trustees, Roosevelt 
requested that the money, now increased to 
$45,000, be distributed to the Red Cross and 
other war charities. 



142 ] GREAT-HEART 



No greater sidelight can be thrown on Roose- 
velt's influence for world peace than this tribute 
paid to him at his death by Baron Makino, the 
head of the Japanese Peace Commission, con- 
vened after the great world war : 

"I embrace this opportunity to pay a tribute 
to the immortal Roosevelt, whose death is 
a sad calamity. He was a superb American, 
also a great world's citizen. His services were not 
confined to America, but extended to the Orient. 
Especially are we grateful to him for the follow- 
ing reasons: 

"First, for his noble services in bringing to a 
successful conclusion the Russo-Japanese war. 
The Japanese public and the rest of the world 
did not comprehend at that time how sturdy were 
his efforts at attain the result, but we who knew 
the inside facts regarding the war situation in 
Manchuria felt that our good friend Roosevelt 
secured a just peace — fair to both parties. 

"Second, we are thankful for his extraordinary 
success in settling the friction between the 
United States and Japan over the San Francisco 
school incident in 1906. 

"Most unusual was it for a President of the 
United States to say that he would use every 
power within his control to secure a right 



GREAT- HEART [143 



settlement. The 'gentlemen's agreement' was the 
result. 

"Third, we are deeply appreciative likewise 
of the fair appraisal he made of Japan's part in 
the World War. Few Americans are apprised 
as to the extent of Japan's participation in the 
war. But this remarkable man fully compre- 
hended and in many published articles gave full 
credit to the stanch, honest co-operation Japan 
gave to her allies and to the United States." 

In 1906 Roosevelt again went contrary to the 
plans of the German government in the Algeciras 
affair. Possessing the pledge of the German Em- 
peror to accept his decision in this international 
dispute, he made a decision that, while just, went 
against Germany. 

It is an interesting commentary, however, 
upon his success as a diplomat that when he came 
to settle the war between Japan and Russia he 
induced the Kaiser to help him in an appeal to 
\he rulers of the warring countries. 

Later on, when he was touring Europe, Roose- 
velt had the unique experience of watching the 
maneuvers of the German troops, in company 
with the Kaiser, whom he had thwarted. On this 
occasion he heard himself thus addressed by the 
Hohenzollern : 



144 ] GREAT- HEART 



"My friend Roosevelt, I am glad to welcome 
you, a most distinguished American. You are the 
first civilian who has ever reviewed German 
soldiers." 




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XI 



Roosevelt's 
Political Victories 

THERE is a phrase, attributed to Napoleon, 
to the effect that God fights on the side of 
the big battahons. There is a truth in the saying 
that apphes to big men, just as well as to big 
armies. 

Fate seemed to battle on the side of Theodore 
Roosevelt through every step of his political 
career, though a study of the man shows that by 
his superhuman energy he himself was almost 
always the creator and molder of the circum- 
stances that seemed to advance him. 

When Roosevelt, at twenty-three, determined 
to enter politics, the political cards were stacked 
against him. 

^Vlien, moved by a desire to belong to the gov- 
erning class instead of to the governed, he told his 
folks that he wanted to join the Republican Club 
as his first step in politics, he relates that they 
told him that he would meet the groom and the 
saloonkeeper there ; that in addition politics were 
low and that for this reason no gentleman could 
TRii [145] 



146 ] GREAT-HEART 



afford to join with such men in ward affairs. 

Roosevelt was as ready then with an answer as 
he was in later life. "If that is so," he replied, 
according to his close friend, Jacob Riis, "the 
groom and the saloonkeeper are the governing 
class and you confess weakness. You have all 
the chances, the education, the position, and you 
let them rule you. They must be better men!" 
He went to the Republican Club, leaving his 
would-be advisers dolefully shaking their heads. 

This opposition overcome, Roosevelt found 
another obstacle in his waj^ He had transferred 
his citizenship from Oyster Bay, where he cast 
his first vote, to the fashionable Murray Hill 
district. He therefore was handicapped by a 
"silk stocking" reputation. Immediately he 
went to work to show the politicians that, while 
he had associated with wearers of silk hose, he 
knew how to wear a slouch hat and how to get 
down to a shirt-sleeves basis if by doing so he 
could make those with whom he mingled feel 
easier. Joe Murray, Roosevelt's first political 
sponsor, was won to him by the genuine spirit of 
democracy he saw in the young aspirant. 

Murray was in need of friends just at that 
time. He had rebelled against the rule of "Jake" 
Hess, the Republican boss of the district. Jake 



GREAT-HEART [ 147 



had his own special candidate for the next Assem- 
blyman from the 21st District. Murray had 
become the leader of the anti-I^ess faction, but 
had no worth-while candidate for the Legisla- 
ture. He observed that Roosevelt was popular 
with the crowd. 

"Look here men," Murray said to his adher- 
ents, "what this district wants is a swell candidate 
who can go as a guest to the drawing room and 
at the same time be man enough to shake hands 
with the butler. Teddy Roosevelt is the one!" 

He asked Roosevelt to become a candidate. 
Roosevelt refused. Instead he suggested the 
names of several men ; but Murray kept on per- 
suading, until at last he drew from Roosevelt a 
promise to be his candidate if he could not secure 
a better one. Joe at once stopped searching. 

"I can't find any better nor as good!" was his 
verdict. The matter ended in the nomination of 
the youthful-looking collegiate "Teddy," now 
thoroughly warm to the campaign. He plunged 
into the battle with an intensity that was earnest 
of the ardor with which he went into his later 
and more important political conflicts. 

The next barrier that rose before the candidate 
was high license. A trip to the saloons was said 
by his political sponsors to be a necessary part 



148 ] GREAT-HEART 



of the campaign. At Valentine Young's saloon 
on Sixth Avenue, Roosevelt opened his campaign. 
Mr. Young was against high license. He 
expressed the hope that Roosevelt was also 
opposed to it. Roosevelt promptly replied that 
he was for it, and would advocate it as hard as 
he could. The argument became hot; the saloon- 
keeper made personal remarks. Then and there 
Roosevelt quitted the saloon canvass, Murray 
and his friends were dismayed, but Roosevelt 
appealed to his neighbors. The silk-stocking vote 
joined that of the footmen and shopkeepers, who 
had become enthusiastic over the scrappy and 
democratic young candidate. Roosevelt was 
elected and became the youngest member of the 
Legislature. 

ROOSEVELT AND THE GRAFTERS 

The next obstruction that confronted young 
Roosevelt was the attitude of his party associates 
in the Legislature. Many of these men were in 
politics for purely commercial reasons. They 
frowned on crusaders and tried to squelch any 
tendency in Roosevelt toward independence of 
thought and action. His part, as they saw it, 
was to be merely the smallest cog in the political 
machine, moving only when a man higher up 
applied the power. 



GREAT-HEART [ l^O 



Though none of these men reaHzed it at the 
time, the appearance of this ardent young man 
in the Legislature marked an epoch. The sun 
was beginning to set for the spoilsmen. The 
better elements of the state needed a force 
behind which they could rally. Roosevelt was 
that man. 

An elevated railroad company had been 
exposed in a scandal that involved the Attorney 
General of the state and a judge of the Supreme 
Court. The public conscience was aroused. The 
people grew indignant when the legislators 
shelved their petitions. Roosevelt stood waiting 
for his elders to act. He could not believe that, 
when such charges had been preferred against 
one of the judiciary, his associates would seek to 
dodge the issue. Convinced at last that nothing 
would be done unless he acted, on April 6, 1882, 
he demanded from the floor that Judge West- 
brook, of Newburgh, be impeached by the 
Assembly. He was a David going up against a 
Goliath of graft and obstruction, yet he attacked 
fearlessly. 

It took splendid moral courage for Roosevelt 
to take this step. Young, idealistic and untrained 
in politics as he was, he could not have been blind 
to the fact that he was facing consequences that 



150 ] GREAT- HEART 



would probably be the ruin of his political career. 

His speech was distinguished by its boldness 
and candor. Before he finished, men with millions 
had been branded as thieves and bribers. A judge 
and an attorney general were denounced in 
terms that startled the public — terms that never- 
theless were potent with truth. 

The Republican leader, with huge contempt 
for the raw young legislator, answered the charge 
patronizingly and with sneers. "I have seen," he 
said, "many reputations in the state broken 
down by loose charges made in the Legislature." 
He recommended to the Assembly that this reck- 
less young man be given time to think, by voting 
to refuse to act on his loose charges. The legis- 
lators obeyed the whip. Mainly through his own 
party Roosevelt went down to defeat. 

The Roosevelt teeth came into evidence then. 
Roosevelt's associates actually heard him gritting 
them. In spite of the ridicule and sneers of the 
previous day Roosevelt returned the next day to 
the charge. 

The press interviewed him. Moved half by 
admiration of the courage of this puny young 
chap, half by a desire to furnish amusement for 
their readers, they told the public of his fight. 
Then, all of a sudden the young David found 



GREAT-HEART [151 



himself vigorously supported. Public opinion 
came to his help in no uncertain way. The state 
was aroused. Roosevelt kept up the fight with 
renewed vigor. Assemblymen began to hear from 
the folks back home. The party leaders trembled 
before the man they could not "gum shoe." The 
Legislature yielded. By a vote of 104 to 6 Roose- 
velt carried the day. The committee whitewashed 
the accused, but the testimony had more than 
vindicated Roosevelt's position. Debauchery in 
politics had received a setback. What was worse 
for the corrupt politicians, they were now at war 
against an adversary who was not to stop fighting 
until the whole nation had been won to his ideals 
of clean politics. 

Back to Albany Roosevelt was sent as an 
Assemblyman in 1882 and again in 1883. In the 
latter year he became minority leader of the 
Assembly, which had now become Democratic. 
With the coming into power of Grover Cleve- 
land the Republicans had gone into retirement 
as a state force until they could put their house 
in order. 

In Roosevelt's last two terms in the Assembly 
he came into close touch with Grover Cleve- 
land, then Governor. Representing opposite 
political faiths, there was nevertheless a bond of 



152 ] GREAT- HEART 



sympathy between the two men in their inde- 
pendence of thought. Cleveland grew to rely on 
his young opponent even more than he did on 
some of the leaders of his own party. The two 
fought shoulder to shoulder in behalf of civil ser- 
vice. Roosevelt, after recommendations for civil 
service improvements had appeared in the Gov- 
ernor's message, pushed through the Legislature 
a state civil service act which was almost parallel 
to the Federal act which went into effect about 
that time. 

Roosevelt's next political fight came in 1884. 
Roosevelt was made chairman of the state dele- 
gation to the Republican convention at Chicago 
which nominated Blaine, "The Plumed Knight," 
as opponent to Cleveland in the Presidential 
campaign. Roosevelt, with typical independence 
of thought, opposed the nomination of Blaine 
and placed in nomination United States Senator 
George F. Edmunds. 

Then came a crucial point in Roosevelt's 
career. He had been classed as a reformer in poli- 
tics and as one that would not work with the 
party organization. Henry Cabot Lodge, of 
Massachusetts, a great personal friend, conferred 
with him as to what they should do. They decided 
that their proper course was to stay with their 



GUEAT-IIEAKT [ li53 



parties; to endeavor by fair means to influence 
its decision, but when its nominations were made 
to stand by the candidates. 

When the Blaine campaign was over Roose- 
velt retired to his Dakota ranch, where he spent 
the next two years. He was called from his ranch 
to become a candidate for Mayor of New York 
City. Opposed to him was Abraham S. Hewitt. 
Roosevelt, because of conditions apart from his 
own popularity and standing, met one of his few 
defeats. 

Next followed Roosevelt's membership in the 
National Civil Service Commission under Presi- 
dents Harrison and Cleveland. Roosevelt's six 
years in Washington as Civil Service Commis- 
sioner opened up for him a broader field than he 
had up to that time entered. Here he began that 
friendship with public men that later was to en- 
circle the nation. 

Little did he expect, however, that there were 
coming events that would make him an occupant 
of the Wliite House. It would be wrong to say 
that he never thought of such a possibility. Every 
American is born a potential resident of the Ex- 
ecutive Mansion, and Roosevelt admitted to 
Henry L. Stoddard that when he was Civil Ser- 
vice Commissioner his heart would beat a little 



154 ] GREAT-HEART 



faster as he walked by the White House and 
thought that possibly — with emphasis on the 
"possibly" — he would some day occupy it as 
President. 

Then came his appointment in 1895 as presi- 
dent of the New York Pohce Board. In 1897 
he received his appointment as Assistant Secre- 
tary of the Navy. The stirring episodes that came 
to him during these periods are related elsewhere 
in this narrative. Out of them he emerged Gov- 
ernor of the State of New York. 

PLATT KEEPS HIS EYE ON ROOSEVELT 

In 1898 Senator Piatt was asked if there was 
any doubt as to the renomination of Frank S. 
Black as Governor of New York. "Yes, there 
is," was his response. "McKinley and Congress 
are liable to declare war on Spain at any moment. 
That war may develop a hero. Theodore Roose- 
velt has just resigned as Assistant Secretary of 
the Navy and is drilling his Rough Riders in the 
West. He may come out of the war adorned 
with such laurels as to compel his nomination." 
Piatt was a true prophet. Roosevelt crowned 
with military glory, came back from the Battle 
of San Juan Hill. Chauncey Depew and others 
suggested to Piatt that Roosevelt would be an 



GREAT-HEART [155 



ideal candidate for Governor. Piatt sent Lemuel 
Eli Quigg, known as "the Accelerator," to Roose- 
velt at Montauk Point, where he was camped 
with his troops. Quigg's mission was to sound 
the Colonel as to his willingness to run for Gov- 
ernor. 

Roosevelt was in a receptive mood. He accep- 
ted the Republican nomination unconditionally, 
but he took pains to announce during the cam- 
paign that on all important questions of policy 
and legislation he would consult with the Repub- 
lican state leader. Senator Piatt. He made it 
clear that he would not act on Piatt's advice if it 
were not in accordance with his o^vn ideas of 
what was right. 

Roosevelt made a dramatic campaign. He 
made Richard Croker, the Tammany boss, who 
had been pilloried by the Lexow committee, an 
issue. The Rough Rider won by over 17,000 
plurality. 

THE MAN WHO REFUSED TO BE SHELVED 

Now Roosevelt came to the crisis of his career. 
The events of the next few years made him later 
President of the United States. Politicians con- 
spired against him, but Fate fought with him. 
He was indeed a "Man of Destiny." 



156 ] GREAT-HEART 



In spite of his agreement with Senator Piatt 
to consult him upon important matters of govern- 
ment — a pledge Roosevelt faithfully kept — ^he 
still became a thorn in the side of Piatt and the 
machine politicians. 

Immediately after his inauguration Governor 
Roosevelt cleaned house in whirlwind fashion at 
Albany. Superintendent of Insurance Lou F. 
Payn, who was thrown out of a job, ran to Sena- 
tor Piatt with this cry : 

"I warned you that this fellow would soon have 
you dangling at his chariot wheel. You would 
not believe me. He has begun by scalping mem- 
bers of your 'Old Guard.' He'll get you, too, 
soon." 

The big dispute between Roosevelt and Piatt 
came when Roosevelt determined that corpora- 
tions must pay a franchise tax. He had bills 
drawn up to this effect. His party leaders 
rebelled. Roosevelt gritted his teeth and drove 
through the Legislature this franchise tax law. 
Following this, Roosevelt let it be known that he 
would be the candidate for renomination as Gov- 
ernor. 

Piatt and his henchmen decided that they had 
had quite enough of him. To eliminate him from 
state politics they decided to shelve him in the 



GREAT- HEART [157 



office of Vice-President. Piatt and his friends 
went to the Repubhcan National Convention at 
Philadelphia determined to carry this plan 
through. Mark Hanna was opposed to nomina- 
ting Roosevelt as a candidate for the Vice-Presi- 
dency. Piatt joined forces with Senator Quay. 

Roosevelt discovered the plan to get rid of hin^, 
and gave the newspapers an interview in which \ 
he stated positively that he would not accept the ) 
nomination; that his most valued friends had 
advised him against being a candidate, and that 
he would follow their advice. 

Senator Piatt went on with his plans. He con- 
ferred with Senator Hanna. Roosevelt came to 
Piatt's rooms. 

"I shall go to the New York caucus and tell 
the delegates that I shall, if nominated for Vice- 
President, arise in the convention and decline." 

*'But you cannot be renominated for Gov- 
ernor, and you are going to be nominated for 
Vice-President," was the retort Piatt claims to 
have made. 

*'I cannot be renominated?" queried Roosevelt. 

"No. Your successor is in this room!" said 
Piatt, pointing to Chairman Odell. 

Facing this situation, Roosevelt let it be known 
that he would yield if the convention "took the 



158 ] GREAT-HEART 



bit in its teeth" and insisted upon nominating 
him. 

The wisdom of the nomination of Roosevelt 
as McKinley's running mate was vindicated at 
the polls. The McKinley-Roosevelt ticket 
smothered that of Bryan and his mate, and New 
York State remained in the Republican column. 
Senator Piatt went down to Washington for the 
inauguration with the remark: 

"I am going to see Roosevelt put on the veil." 

But Piatt and the men who thought Roosevelt 
was safely out of the way were overlooking the 
fact that Roosevelt's fortune was in the hand of 
a greater power than theirs. 

Roosevelt's term as Vice-President proved to 
be short. He took office on March 4, 1901, and 
presided over the Senate at the succeeding ses- 
sion. With McKinley and his Cabinet his rela- 
tions were intimate and cordial. 

In September Roosevelt went camping with 
his family in the Adirondacks. There he received 
the news of the shooting of President McKinley, 
who died before the Vice-President could reach 
his bedside. Roosevelt took the oath of office as 
President at Buffalo on the evening of 
September 14-. 

The new President fully appreciated the 



GKEAT-IIEART [ 159 



deplorable circumstances under which he became 
the head of the nation. He issued this procla- 
mation : 

"In this hour of deep and national bereavement 
I wish to state that it shall be my aim to continue 
absolutely and without variance the policy of 
President McKinley, for the peace, prosperity 
and honor of our beloved country." Roosevelt 
kept this pledge to the letter. 

Afterward Senator Piatt, with true political 
sagacity, claimed credit for his insistence upon 
the nomination for the Vice-Presidency, since it 
had led to Roosevelt becoming President of the 
United States. Those, however, who knew of the 
anxiety of the New York politicians to get rid of 
Roosevelt as a factor in state politics looked the 
other way and winked. 



XII 

First Years 
in the Presidency 

WHEN Roosevelt was a member of the New 
York Legislature, Andrew D. White, 
President of Cornell College, who had been keenly 
watching his career, remarked to his class: 

"Young gentlemen, some of you will enter 
public life. I call your attention to Theodore 
Roosevelt, now in our legislature. He is on the 
right road to success. It is dangerous to predict 
a future for a young man, but let me tell you that 
if any man of his age was ever pointed straight 
for the Presidency, that man is Theodore Roose- 
velt." 

Mr. White was not alone in his opinion. 
George W. Curtis, who was then editor of Har- 
per's "Easy Chair," thus answered a man who 
sneered at the youth and obscurity of Roosevelt: 

"You will know more, sir, later; a good deal 
more, or I am much in error. Young? Why, he 
is just out of school almost, yet he is a force to 
be reckoned with in New York. Later the nation 
will be criticizing or praising him. While respect- 

[100] 



GREAT-HEAllT [ IGl 



ful to the gray hairs and experience of his elders, 
not one of them can move him an iota from con- 
victions as to men and measures once formed and 
rooted. He will not truckle nor cringe; he seems 
to court opposition to the point of being some- 
what pugnacious. His political life will probably 
be turbulent ; but he will be a figure, not a figure- 
head, in future developments — or if not, it will 
be because he gives up politics altogether." 

These opinions from men who knew Roosevelt 
all his life go to show that his course to the Presi- 
dency was clearly marked for him from the time 
he entered New York politics. 

Jeremiah Curtin, the historian and philosopher, 
was another person who early became impressed 
with the idea that Roosevelt was a dynamic force 
for the highest place in the land. Curtin, in his 
"History of the Mongols," wrote thus of seeing 
Roosevelt as a Civil Service Commissioner: 

"All at once, in the large room before us, I saw 
a young man, alert to his duties and perfectly 
confident. There was no one else in the apart- 
ment. I told (Congressman) Greenlialge to 
look at him. 

" 'That man looks precisely as if he had exam- 
ined the building and, finding it suitable, has 
made up his mind to inliabit it!' 

TR12 



162 ] GREAT-HEART 



" 'He is the living picture of that pose/ replied 
Greenhalge; 'but did you know him? That is 
Theodore Roosevelt!' " 

The assassination of President McKinley, 
which led Roosevelt to the White House, simply 
hastened the goal which was already in sight. 

From his early days in politics he took a higfe 
moral stand and formed the habit of going tf)\ 
the people over the heads of the politicians wheri- 
ever he thought that the public interest required 
such drastic measures. He set for himself a higli 
standard, yet, when he quitted the Presidency, 
that standard had been set even higher than whext^ 
he made his first campaign for clean politics in the 
New York Legislature. 

Roosevelt's first notable act on entering the 
Presidency was to retain in office all of McKin- 
ley's subordinates. It had been the habit on the 
three previous occasions when Vice-Presidents 
succeeded Presidents through the death of the 
President to change the personnel of the higher 
ofiices, especially in the Cabinet. Roosevelt did 
not think this a wise course. He asked all of 
the members of the Cabinet to stay and help him 
carry out McKinley's policies. 

Some of his friends told him this would make 
him only "a pale copy of McKinley." He told 



GREAT-HEART [163 



them that he was not concerned in following or 
not following in McKinley's footsteps. What he 
wanted to do was to face and solve the new prob- 
lems that arose. 

THE GREAT COAL STRIKE 

In the fall of 1902 he adopted a course of 
action in regard to labor disputes that, at the 
time, called forth much criticism, but which from 
the public standpoint was soon justified. 

That spring a universal strike began in the 
anthracite coal regions. It was continued through 
the summer and early fall. The feeling between 
the mine operators and the miners was very 
bitter, and the big operators had banded together 
and refused to yield a point in their dispute with 
their workers. 

As winter approached a coal famine menaced 
the nation. In the East, where anthracite is the 
principal household fuel, soft coal proved to be 
a very poor substitute. 

The Governor of Massachusetts and the Mayor 
of New York were among the conservative men 
who urged Roosevelt to take action. They 
pointed out that if the coal famine continued the 
suffering throughout the Northeast would be 
alarming and that disastrous riots were liable 
to occur. 



164 ] GREAT-HEAET 



Roosevelt delayed interfering as long as pos- 
sible, though he directed Carroll Wright, head 
of the Labor Bureau, to report all of the facts of 
the case to him. 

The coal operators, knowing that the suffering 
among the miners was great, felt confident that 
if the government did not interfere, the miners 
would be forced to yield. Bent on winning, they 
refused to see that the rights of the people were 
affected. 

Roosevelt saw things from the people's view- 
point and tried to get both sides to submit to a 
commission of arbitration, with a promise to 
accept its decision. Under this arrangement the 
miners were to go to work as soon as the com- 
mission was appointed, at the old rate of wages. 
The miners, headed by John Mitchell, agreed to 
this proposition. The operators refused and 
Roosevelt confined his efforts to securing an 
agreement between the operators and the miners. 

On October 3 he called the representatives of 
both before him. This time Roosevelt, by sheer 
force of will, secured his object. The operators 
obstinately held out for the appointment of a 
commission of five that did not include even one 
representative of labor. Roosevelt insisted that 
labor he represented and carried his point. 



GREAT-HEART [ 165 



Human rights had triumphed over property 
rights. 

When the battle was over the President stood 
clearly before the people as a man who would 
champion them against the so-called captains of 
industry when it was necessary to do so. 

The President let it be known early in his ad- 
ministration that in the South he would appoint 
good Democrats to office rather than bad Repub- 
licans. 

It was while the President was making ap- 
pointments of Democrats to office in the South, 
winning praise from those who had never before 
praised anything Republican, that the famous 
Booker T. Washington incident took place. 

It had been through the help of the South that 
Washington had been able to accomplish his 
great work as a negro educator, but this section 
of the country, with the negro as a social problem 
very close to it, bitterly resented Roosevelt's 
dining with the colored man. 

The South took it as an affront, though evi- 
dently the President had not thought one way 
or the other as to the possible consequences. The 
criticisms heaped upon him he ignored. 

Roosevelt did not long remain in the bad graces 
of the Southern people. He did not permit the 



166 ] GREAT- HEART 



South to forget that his mother was a Georgian 
woman, and that her brothers had fought in the 
Confederacy. The following incident illustrates 
the fine diplomacy with which he won back the 
regard of the Southern people: 

On one of his Southern trips his train stopped 
at Charlotte, N. C. A committee of women led 
by Mrs. Thomas J. Jackson, widow of General 
Stonewall Jackson, was at the depot to meet 
Colonel Roosevelt. When he was introduced he 
referred to himself as by right a Southerner, and 
then being introduced to Mrs. Jackson, he added 
a remark which flashed through the South: 

"Wliat! The widow of the great Stonewall 
Jackson? Why, it is worth the whole trip down 
here to have a chance to shake your hand," and 
he reminded her that he had appointed her grand- 
son to a cadetship at West Point. 

The South loved a fighter, and Roosevelt put 
his knowledge of this fact to good use when he 
went on a campaigning tour of that territory. 
If there had been anything timorous about him 
he would have attacked the Democracy in Min- 
nesota, where it would be safe to do so. Instead, 
he picked out Atlanta, where his audience was 
composed almost entirely of Democrats. 

The audience tried to roar him down. For five 



GREAT-HEART [167 



minutes the tumult went on. It seemed as if the 
meeting could not go on. Roosevelt then made 
a characteristically audacious move. There was 
a table near him, and he leaped upon it. The 
mob was startled into stillness. Before it could 
recover from its surprise, he had poured forth a 
half-dozen striking sentences, and by that time 
his opponents were interested enough to give him 
a hearing. 

A FRANK CANDIDATE 

From the date of his entering the Presidency 
until after the election of 1904 Roosevelt was 
under restraint. Although he knew that his poli- 
cies had the full approval of the people, he felt 
himself to be a President by accident. It is well 
known that he desired a nomination and election 
in 1904. 

"I do not believe in playing the hypocrite," 
he said. "Any strong man fit to be President 
would desire a nomination and re-election after 
his first term. Lincoln was President in so great 
a crisis that perhaps he neither could nor did 
feel any personal interest in his own re-election. 
But at present I should like to be elected Presi- 
dent just as John Quincy Adams, or McKinley, 
or Cleveland, or John Adams, or Washington 



168 ] GREAT-HEART 



himself desired to be elected. It is pleasant to 
think that one's countrymen think well of him. 
But I shall not do anything whatever to secure 
my nomination save to try to carry on the public 
business in such shape that decent citizens will 
believe I have shown wisdom, integrity and 
courage." 

From the start his nomination was assured, 
although there was already strong opposition to 
him on the part of many machine politicians. 

No other name than his was seriously consid- 
ered in the convention. He was nominated for 
the Presidency at Chicago on June 23, with 
Charles W. Fairbanks, of Indiana, as candidate 
for Vice-President. He was elected in November 
by a popular vote of 2,523,750 over Alton B. 
Parker, the Democratic candidate, and a ma- 
jority over all candidates of 1,735,403. The vote 
in the electoral college was 336 for Roosevelt 
to 140 for Parker. 

It was the largest popular support that any 
President of the United States had ever received. 

BUILDING THE PANAMA CANAL 

In foreign affairs the most important action 
Roosevelt took during the second administration 
was in regard to the building of the Panama 



GREAT-HEART [169 



Canal. His action is still termed "unconstitu- 
tional" by many people, and a bill is now under 
discussion to compensate Colombia for the alleged 
damages she sustained through the secession of 
the State of Panama, and the building of the 
canal without her consent. 

Roosevelt's defense, and the defense of his 
eminent Secretary of State, John Hay, was, to 
put it bluntly, "We got the canal." 

During the four centuries that had passed 
since Balboa crossed the Isthmus, statesmen had 
talked of connecting the Atlantic and Pacific 
oceans by an Isthmus canal. It had been talked 
about in Washington for a half-century, but 
nothing had come of of it. 

Shortly after Roosevelt became President, an 
agreement was reached with the French Panama 
Company, and the Hay-Pauncefote Treaty was 
signed, by which the United States acquired 
possession, so far as Europe was concerned, which 
warranted her undertaking the task. 

The logical location for the canal was the line 
already begun by the French company in Pana- 
ma. Panama belonged to Colombia. Colombia 
had promised friendly co-operation. Her delegate 
to the Pan-American Congress in Mexico had 
joined in the unanimous vote which requested the 



170 ] GKEAT-HEAET 



United States to proceed with building the canal. 

Both Colombia and the Isthmus had been 
places of frequent revolutions and outbreaks. 
Many times United States warships had been 
forced to patrol the Isthmus, at times at the 
urgent request of the Colombian government. 
Through another revolution Colombia had come 
under the dictatorship of Marquin, its former 
vice-president. Marquin, although he had con- 
sented to the Hay-Herraii Treaty, by which Co- 
lombia had agreed to the building of the canal, 
now made use of his power as a dictator to break 
his promise. He summoned a congress especially 
to break the canal treaty. This congress, which 
Roosevelt describes as "a congress of mere pup- 
pets," carried out Marquin's wishes. The treaty 
was rejected. 

The President, through Secretary Hay, had 
warned Colombia that grave consequences might 
follow her rejection of the treaty. He had infor- 
mation that the entire population of Panama 
felt that it was of vital concern to their property 
that the canal be immediately built; newspaper 
correspondents predicted a revolution on the 
Isthmus. 

On November 3, 1903, the revolution occurred. 
The Colombian troops stationed on the Isthmus 



GKEAT-HEART [171 



joined in the revolution, and there was no blood- 
shed, except the life of an unfortunate Chinaman. 

Roosevelt immediately recognized the Republic 
of Panama and the other principal nations did 
likewise. A canal treaty was at once negotiated 
with the new republic, and, after considerable 
debate in the Senate, the treaty was ratified by 
that body and the work on the canal began. 

Roosevelt's case against Colombia was that, 
so long as the United States was considering the 
alternative route through Nicaragua, Colombia 
eagerly pressed this country to build a canal 
across the Isthmus. WTien the United States was 
committed to this latter course, Colombia, under 
her usurper, refused to fulfil the agreement, with 
the hope of securing the rights and property of 
the French Panama Company, so as to secure 
the $40,000,000 the United States had authorized 
as payment to his company. John Hay 
thus defended Roosevelt's course: "The action 
of the President in the Panama matter is not 
only in the strictest accordance with the princi- 
ples of justice and equity, and in line with the 
best precedents of our public policy, but it was 
the only course he could have taken in compliance 
with our treaty rights and obligations." 

In November, 1906, the President's interest in 



172 ] GREAT-HEART 



the work on the canal led him to go in person 
to Panama. This act caused a storm of disap- 
proval in certain quarters, similar to that which 
President Wilson met when he decided to attend 
the peace conference at Paris. Roosevelt's critics 
pointed out that no President had ever gone 
beyond the bounds of his country. Roosevelt went 
and let his critics howl. Here, in one thing at 
least, Wilson and Roosevelt were in agreement, 
namely, that where the President of this country 
sets foot that place is within the sphere of the 
United States. 



XIII 

Good Will Abroad; 
A Square Deal at Home 

IN Roosevelt's opinion and in the opinion of 
the entire country, his act in sending the fleet 
upon its world mission did more to favorably 
advertise the United States to the world and to 
establish cordial international relations, than any 
other of his deeds as President. His object in 
sending the battle fleet on this voyage was to 
prove to foreign nations that American battle- 
ships could be assembled in the Pacific Ocean as 
well as in the Atlantic, without this movement 
assuming the nature of a threat against any 
Asiatic or European power. 

The impression prevailed among foreign navies 
that the American fleet could not pass from the 
Atlantic to the Pacific. The English and Ger- 
man naval authorities thought it impossible to 
take their own fleets of great battleships around 
the world, and, of course, they did not belicA'^e that 
the American fleet could make the voyage. 

Then, too, Europe was expecting a war be- 
tween the United States and Japan and thought 
that if such a fleet sailed into the Pacific, Japan 

[173] 



174 ] GREAT-HEART 



would think that the United States intended to 
attack her. Roosevelt desired to clear up all of 
these notions. He wanted to establish friendly 
relations with Japan and he wanted more than 
anything else to arouse the pride of the American 
people in their navy. 

All of the President's purposes were accom- 
plished. The cruise made a deep and favorable 
impression abroad, and no single thing in the 
history of the new United States Navy did as 
much to stimulate the American public's enthusi- 
asm as this voyage. Everything worked out just 
as was thus predicted by the "London Spectator" 
when the fleet sailed from Hampton Roads: 

"All over America the people will follow the 
movements of the fleet; they will learn something 
of the intricate details of the coaling and commis- 
sariat work under war-like conditions, and in a 
word their attention will be aroused. Next time 
Mr. Roosevelt or his representatives appeal to the 
country for new battleships they will do so to 
people whose minds have been influenced one 
way or the other. The naval programme will 
not have stood still. We are sure that, apart 
from increasing the efficiency of the existing 
fleet, this is the aim which Roosevelt has in mind. 
He has a policy which projects itself far into the 



GREAT-HEART [ 175 



future, but it is an entire misreading of it to 
suppose that it is aimed narrowly and definitely 
at any single power." 

The fleet of sixteen battleships which, though 
it may seem small in comparison with the navies 
that have been engaged in the world war, was 
a large one in those days, went through the Strait 
of Magellan to San Francisco. From there 
Roosevelt ordered them to sail to New Zealand 
and Australia, stopping at the Philippines, China 
and Japan, then home through the Suez Canal, 
stopping in the Mediterranean. There was never 
a hitch or a delay in the schedule. The most 
notable incident of the cruise was the warm recep- 
tion given to the fleet by the Japanese. When the 
fleet returned after its sixteen months' voyage, 
Roosevelt greeted it in Hampton Roads. The 
battleships arrived there on Washington's Birth- 
day, February 22, 1907. 

Roosevelt's views on the success of this expe- 
dition are best summed up in the following 
address, which he spoke on the flagship of the 
admiral to the officers and enlisted men: 

"Over a year has passed since you steamed out 
of this harbor, and over the world's rim, and 
this morning the hearts of all who saw you thrilled 
with pride as the hulls of the mighty warships 



176 ] GREAT-HEART 



lifted above the horizon. You have been in the 
Northern and Southern Hemispheres ; four times 
you have crossed the line; you have steamed 
through all the gi'eat oceans; you have touched 
the coast of every continent. Ever your general 
course has been westward; and now you come 
back to the port from which you set sail. This 
is the first battle fleet that has ever circumnavi- 
gated the globe. Those who perform the feat can 
but follow in your footsteps. 

"The little torpedo flotilla went with you 
around South America, through the Straits of 
Magellan, to our own Pacific Coast. The armored 
cruiser squadron met you, and left you again, 
when you were half-way round the world. In all 
your long cruise not an accident worthy of men- 
tion has happened to a single battleship, nor yet 
to the cruisers or torpedo boats. You left this 
coast in a high state of efficiency and you return 
with j^our efficiency increased; better prepared 
than when you left, not only in personnel, but 
even in material. During your world cruise you 
have taken your regular gunnery practice, and 
skilled though you were before with the guns, 
you have grown more skilful still; and through 
practice you have improved in battle tactics, 
though here there is more room for improvement 




ROOSEVELT ARKIVIXfi AT (GARDINER, MONT., OX THE 
WAV TO VELI.OWSTOXE PARK 



GREAT- HEART [177 



than in your gunnery. Incidentally, I suppose 
I need hardly say that one measure of your fitness 
must be your clear recognition of the need always 
steadily to strive to render yourselves more fit; 
if you ever grow to think that you are fit enough, 
you can make up your minds that from that 
moment you will begin to go backward. 

"As a war machine the fleet comes back in 
better shape than it went out. In addition, you, 
the officers and men of this formidable fighting 
force, have shown yourselves the best of all pos- 
sible ambassadors and heralds of peace. Wher- 
ever you have landed j^ou have borne yourselves 
so as to make us at home proud of being your 
countrymen. You have shown that the best type 
of fighting man of the sea knows how to appear 
to the utmost possible advantage when his busi- 
ness is to behave himself on shore, and to make 
a good impression in a foreign land. We are 
proud of all the ships and all the men in this 
whole fleet, and we welcome you home to the 
country whose good repute among nations has 
been raised by what you have done." 

OUR FIRST SHIELD against BOLSHEVISM 

Roosevelt's chief service to his country while 
President was undoubtedly that of preventing 

TR13 



178 ] GREAT-HEART 



the huge combinations and trusts which threat- 
ened to gain control of the country during his 
administration. i 

For years great business corporations had 
been in formation. They controlled enormous 
wealth and their financial power led them to 
disregard public opinion, even to the extent of 
defying the law. 

Public disapproval was growing stronger and 
stronger. Independent newspapers and maga- 
zines had informed the public of the oppressive 
methods of these trusts. A leader was wanted. 
Roosevelt became that leader. | 

The foe was mighty. It had entrenched itself 
in Congress, yet Roosevelt won several note- 
worthy victories and started the nation in the 
way of ending this evil. 

The warfare against the trusts was continued 
throughout Roosevelt's entire administration. 
Measures for the control of the trusts were pre- 
pared and pressed on Congress with Rooseveltian 
strenuosity. 

A railway rate bill was passed, forbidding 
under severe penalties the fraud of rebates. A 
general pure food law was passed, penalizing 
the act of adulteration, and requiring that every 
article of medicine or food should be labeled and 



GREAT-HEART [179 



sold for just what it was. With these and several 
other measures, corporation fraud was thus 
brought to a halt. 

At this period Roosevelt was a flaming fire. 
His spirit was as a fierce blaze consuming the 
materialism that had crept from the ranks of 
business into public life. Popular grievances 
against unjust exploitation by leaders of industry 
became to him the signal to attack. His ordering 
of the suit of dissolution against the Northern 
Securities Company subjected him to the enmity 
of powerful men, yet before a short time passed 
the opinion became general that his decision had 
been vital to the public good. 

He aroused the bitter opposition of Big Busi- 
ness by his successful endeavors to control it, but 
time proved that by his act on behalf of the 
people he had saved the vested interests from 
the wholesale division by Congress of such 
monopolies had they been formed. 

While he was the first of our Presidents to 
come into conflict with corporate power, he never- 
theless favored and promoted legitimate business, 
and he stood for the protection of American in- 
dustries from the cheap labor of Europe. 

His suit for the dissolution of the Standard 
Oil Company was one of the most significant 



180 ] GREAT-HEART 



acts of his administration. This suit was not 
brought to a successful conclusion until 1911, 
but the credit for its prosecution is due mainly 
to him. 

In all these measures Roosevelt was simply 
carrying out his doctrine of the square deal, 
which he began to preach when he assumed public 
office and which in different language, but with 
unvarying purpose, he preached to the end of his 
life. 

His doctrine of fair dealing is best summed up 
in this speech spoken at Dallas, Tex., April 
5, 1905: 

"T^Tien I say I believe in a square deal I do 
not mean, and probably nobody that speaks the 
truth can mean, that he believes it possible to 
give every man the best hand. If the cards do 
not come to any man, or if they do come, and 
he has not got the power to play them, that is 
his affair. All I mean is that there shall be no 
crookedness in the dealing. In other words, it is 
not in the power of any human being to devise 
legislation or administration by which each man 
shall achieve success and have happiness; it not 
only is not in the power of any man to do that, 
but if any man says that he can do it, distrust 
him as a quack. . . . All any of us can pretend 



GKE AT- HEART [181 



to do is to come as near as our imperfect abilities 
will allow to securing through governmental 
agencies an equal opportunity for each man to 
show the stuff that is in him; and that must be 
done with no more intention of discrimination 
against the rich man than the poor man, or 
against the poor man than the rich man; with 
the intention of safeguarding every man, rich or 
poor, poor or rich, in his rights, and giving him 
as nearly as may be a fair chance to do what 
his powers permit him to do ; always providing he 
does not wrong his neighbor." 

This view he re-emphasized at another place: 
"When I say a square deal I mean a square 
deal; exactly as much a square deal for the rich 
man as for the poor man; but no more. Let 
each stand on his merits, receive what is due him, 
and be judged according to his deserts. To more 
he is not entitled, and less he shall not have." 

"This government was formed with, as its 
basic idea, the principle of treating each man on 
his worth as a man, of paying no heed to whether 
he was rich or poor, no heed to his creed or social 
standing, but only to the way in which he per- 
formed his duties to himself, to his neighbor, to 
the state. From this principle we cannot afford 
to vary by so much as a hand's breadth." 



182 ] GREAT- HEART 



It would be a mistake to think that while at- 
tacking the evils of corporate power he did not 
also attack those men of Bolshevik tendencies 
who out of mere discontent, tried to stir up class 
feeling. 

This is what he had to say about these men: 

"In dealing with both labor and capital and 
the questions affecting both corporations and 
trade unions, there is one matter more important 
to remember than aught else, and that is the 
infinite harm done by preachers of mere discon- 
tent. These are the men who seek to excite a 
violent class hatred against all men of wealth. 
They seek to turn wise and proper movements 
for the better control of corporations and for 
doing away with the abuses connected with 
wealth into a campaign of hysterical excitement 
and falsehood in which the aim is to inflame to 
madness the brutal passions of mankind. . . ." 

One shudders to think of what fate would have 
befallen the United States if the monopolies 
which Roosevelt curbed while he was President 
had been allowed to flourish until this era of revo- 
lution. That the working people of America are 
contented and peace-loving today is largely due 
to Roosevelt's saving them from exploitation by 
the trusts. 



GREAT-HEART [ 183 



CONSERVING OUR NATURAL WEALTH 

Most important in his own estimation and 
from the standpoint of personal credit, was 
Roosevelt's work for the conservation of the 
natural resources of the country. In May, 1908, 
he called a conference of the Governors of all 
the states for this purpose. 

The natural wealth of the nation was disap- 
pearing at an alarming rate. The forests were 
being destroyed by wasteful methods of lumber- 
ing and by devastating fires. The coal supply 
was being wastefully handled. Ignorance and 
greed were exhausting the fisheries. These things 
needed wise and honest treatment and the con- 
ference led to the formation of a National Con- 
servation Commission to take these matters in 
hand. 

PRESIDENTIAL DIVERSIONS 

VV^hile President Roosevelt coined many ex- 
pressive terms that still remain as part of 
American speech — such phrases as * 'Malefactors 
of great wealth," "Speak softly but carry a big 
stick," "Swollen fortunes," originated with him. 

He branded so many men as liars that a news- 
paper humorist coined the name "Ananias Club," 



184 ] GREAT-HEART 



and used it to include most of those who had 
incurred Mr. Roosevelt's enmity. The name 
stuck, but it did not deter Mr. Roosevelt from 
going right on calling a spade a spade. 

Roosevelt kept his mind fresh in the stifling 
political atmosphere of the Capitol by keeping 
in touch with his Rough Rider and cowboy 
friends. 

In spite of his strenuous battles, Roosevelt 
always found time for play and diversion while 
he was an occupant of the White House. He it 
was who started the army upon a course of physi- 
cal training that undoubtedly had a bearing upon 
its efficiency in France. Old swivel-chair officers 
secretly rebelled against his order that they 
should show their physical ability by periodical 
long-distance hikes and rides, but when the 
President showed that he was willing to lead 
the way and undergo the same tests, there was 
nothing to do but submit. 

SELECTS TAFT TO SUCCEED HIM 

Roosevelt was now confronted by the problem 
as to whether he should run for a third term. Pre- 
viously, in a public address, he had made the 
statement that he would not be a candidate for a 
third term. If he had listened to the pleadings 



GREAT-IIEAKT [185 



of his friends and allowed himself to be nom- 
inated there is no doubt that he would have been 
elected. 

PI is answer to the pleas of his admirers and 
to the voice of perhaps his own ambition was to 
select William Howard Taft as his successor and 
to urge his nornination, taking care to let the 
Republican national convention know that he 
himself would refuse a nomination. Taft was 
nominated on the first ballot. 

On March 4, 1909, William H. Taft was inau- 
gurated as President of the United States. That 
day Roosevelt left Washington. 



"Let us therefore boldly face the life of strife, 
resolute to do our duty well and manfully; reso- 
lute to uphold righteousness by deed and by 
word; resolute to be both honest and brave; to 
serve high ideals, yet to use practical methods. 
Above all, let us shrink from no strife, moral or 
physical, within or without the nation, provided 
we are certain that the strife is justified, for it is 
only through strife, through hard and dangerous 
endeavor, that we shall ultimately win the goal 
of true national greatness. 

Theodore Roosevelt/^ 



XIV 

The "Bull Moose 



')') 



AFTER more than a year's absence in Africa 
XJL and Europe, Roosevelt returned to the 
United States in June, 1910, and again, both by 
inclination and the compelling force of circum- 
stances, took an active interest in politics. 

While Roosevelt was hunting in Africa, there 
came a sharp division in the Republican party. 
The conservatives who supported Taft and the 
rebels who could see no good in his policies devel- 
oped into bitter factions, each of which tried to 
win the support of Roosevelt when he returned 
home crowned with world honors. For a time 
Roosevelt kept silent, hearing both sides of the 
matter, weighing the evidence in the dispute, 
trjdng to determine whether it was wise to con- 
tinue the support he had given Taft formerly, 
or to listen to these new but strong voices that 
had arisen in his party since he himself left the 
Presidency. 

The first indication of the stand Roosevelt was 
to take appeared when he let it become known 
that he approved Gifford Pinchot's stand in his 
controversy with Ballinger, whom Taft had sup- 
ported. He also announced that he opposed cer- 

[187] 



188 ] GREAT-HEART 



tain treaties with Japan and South America 
which Taft was advocating. As the months 
passed Taft became the champion of conservative 
Repubhcanism, and the forceful personahty and 
progressive spirit of Roosevelt made him the 
natural leader of the revolting group. 

In 1910 Roosevelt made a tour of the country, 
in which he announced the doctrine of the New 
Nationalism. He advocated a closer relation be- 
tween the states and the national government; 
making economic opportunity equal; conserving 
the resources of the nation; military prepared- 
ness; and the shifting of the viewpoints of the 
courts from too much emphasis on the security of 
property and contracts to a greater concern for 
the welfare of human beings. 

To these principles Roosevelt added, in 1912, 
the issues of direct nominations, preferential pri- 
maries, the initiative, the referendum, and the 
recall for judicial decisions as well as for officials. 
These reforms he announced as a new Charter 
for Democracy and when, in 1912, in answer to 
the appeal of seven Governors, he announced that 
he would become a candidate for the Presidency, 
these doctrines were embodied in the platform 
of his party. 

Roosevelt made a typically strenuous fight for 



GREAT- HEART [189 



the control of delegates to the national Repub- 
lican Convention, and when he was defeated he 
and his supporters created the Progressive party, 
by which at Chicago, he was nominated for the 
Presidency. In response to those who criticised 
him for seeking a third term when he had pre- 
viously announced that he would not accept an- 
other nomination, he explained that he had meant 
three consecutive terms. 

It was while he was conducting a whirlwind 
campaign for election that he was shot by a crank. 
The shooting occurred in Milwaukee. Roosevelt 
was entering the automobile that was to drive 
him to the meeting place when the fanatic fired 
at him. The bullet lodged in his shoulder. With 
characteristic dauntlessness, Roosevelt insisted 
on going on the platform, where he told the wait- 
ing multitude that he had been shot, and then 
went on to deliver a rousing speech that lasted 
over an hour. 

^\nien Woodrow Wilson heard of the assault 
upon Roosevelt, he chivalrously offered to dis- 
continue his own campaign, but the Colonel re- 
fused this concession. After a few days spent in 
recuperation he resumed his speaking tour with 
undiminished vigor. In the Presidential election 
which followed he received eighty-eight electoral 



190 ] GREAT-HEART 



votes. He had divided the Repubhcan party in 
all states. In twenty-eight of the states he re- 
ceived a majority over Taft, Through this divi- 
sion in the Republican ranks, Woodrow Wilson 
became President. 

WORLD PEACE 

While Roosevelt and Wilson were for the 
most part in opposition to each other, some 
have wrongly said, with regard to the proposal 
for a league of nations, that Roosevelt was back- 
ward and reactionary in his attitude. This is 
directly confuted by the prophetic speech he 
delivered at Christiania, Norway, May 5, 1910, 
while on his world tour. His utterance there 
shows that fundamentally President Wilson and 
he were thinking alike on this subject: 

"Something should be done as soon as possible 
to check the growth of armaments, especially 
naval armaments, by international agreement. 
No one power could or should act by itself; for 
it is eminently undesirable, from the standpoint 
of peace and righteousness, that a power 
which really does believe in peace should place 
itself at the mercy of some rival which may at 
bottom have no such belief and no intention of 
acting on it. 



GllEAT-HEART [ 191 



"But, granted sincerity of purpose, the great 
powers of the world should find no insurmount- 
able difficulty in reaching an agreement which 
would put an end to the present costly and grow- 
ing extravagances of expenditures on naval arma- 
ments. An agreement merely to limit the size of 
ships would have been very useful a few years 
ago, and would still be of use ; but the agreement 
should go much further. 

"Finally, it would be a master stroke if those 
great powers honestly bent on peace would form 
a league of peace, not only to keep peace among 
themselves, but to prevent by force if necessary, 
its being broken by others. 

"The supreme difficulty in connection with 
developing the peace work of The Hague arises 
from the lack of any executive power, of any 
police power to enforce the decrees of the court. 
In any community of any size the authority of 
the courts rests upon actual or potential force; 
on the existence of a police, or on the knowledge 
that the able-bodied men of the country are both 
ready and willing to see that the decrees of judi- 
cial and legislative bodies are put into effect. 

"In new and wild communities where there is 
violence, an honest man must protect himself, 
and until other means of securing his safety are 



192 ] GREAT-HEART 



devised, it is both foolish and wicked to persuade 
him to surrender his arms while the men who are 
dangerous to the community remain there. He 
should not renounce the right to protect himself 
by his own efforts until the community is so 
organized that it can effectively relieve the indi- 
vidual of the duty of putting down violence. 

"So it is with nations. Each nation must keep 
well prepared to defend itself until the establish- 
ment of some form of international police power, 
competent and willing to prevent violence as 
between nations. As things are now, such powers 
to command peace throughout the world could 
best be assured by some combination between 
those great nations which sincerely desire peace 
and have no thought themselves of commit- 
ting aggressions. The combination might at first 
be only to secure peace within certain definite 
limits and certain definite conditions; but the 
ruler or statesman who should bring about such .| 
a combination would have earned his place in 
history for all time and his title to the gratitude 
of all mankind." 




ROOSEVELT AS A GRANDFATHER 



XV 

From White House 
to Jungle 

"Oh, our manhood's prime vigor I No spirit 
feels waste, 

Not a muscle is stopped in its playing 
nor sinew unbraced. 

Oh, the wild joys of living! The leaping 
from rock to rock; 

The strong rending of boughs from the fir- 
trees; the cool, silver shock 

Of the plunge in a pool's living water; the 
hunt of the bear, 

And the sultriness showing the lion is 
crouched in his lair. 



How good is man's life, the mere living I 
How fit to employ 

All the heart and the soul and the senses 
forever in joy!" 

TR14 [193] 



194 ] GREAT-HEART 



THESE splendid lines of Browning were 
Roosevelt's outdoor creed. His exploits as 
a hunter in Africa were merely a development 
of his life as a naturalist and out-of-door man. 
At Harvard Roosevelt had devoted himself 
to a study of natural science, and had even 
thought seriously of making it his lifework. Poli- 
tics claimed him then, but always underlying 
Roosevelt the statesman was Roosevelt the 
naturalist. 

Francis Parkman — hunter, trapper, horticul- 
turist and America's most interesting historian — 
was Roosevelt's example for his life in the open. 
There was a close relation between the careers of 
the two men. Parkman was handicapped in 
health and bad eyesight. Roosevelt, as a youth, 
had a weak frame and his sight was also poor. 
Parkman loved Nature and had a passion for 
writing. He had an indomitable will that enabled 
him to overcome his physical handicaps and to 
make a splendid mark in literature. Roosevelt 
possessed the same qualities. 

It was with Parkman in mind that Roosevelt 
scaled the most difficult peaks of the Alps; 
plunged in the Canadian wilderness; took up 
prairie life. As a result of the trained eye and 
trained ear Roosevelt gained through these 



GKEAT- HEART [ 195 



experiences, in his books will be found observa- 
tions of animal life and bird life, and a knowledge 
of plants and trees that is enlightening to even 
the experienced naturalist. 

John Burroughs, in his book "Camping and 
Tramping with Roosevelt," states that when 
Roosevelt entered Yellowstone Park he wanted 
all the freedom and solitude possible. The Colonel 
craved to be alone with Nature. It was evi- 
dent that he was hungry for the wild and the 
aboriginal. It was this hunger that came to him 
periodically and resulted in his going forth on 
hunting and exploring trips to the Far West, 
Africa and Brazil. 

As an illustration of the fact that it was love 
of nature itself more than love of killing that 
drove Roosevelt into the wilds, Burroughs 
describes how, at their second camp, which they 
reached in mid-afternoon, their attention was 
attracted by a strange note in the spruce woods. 
The question arose as to whether it was a bird or 
a beast. Their guide thought it was an owl. 

"Let's run that bird down," said the Colonel 
to Burroughs. 

They ran across a small open plain and at last 
saw the bird on the peak of a spruce. Burroughs 
imitated its call, but they could not discern the 
species of the bird. 



196 ] GREAT-HEART 



"Why did we not think to bring the glasses?" 
said Roosevelt. 

"I will run and get them," said Burroughs. 

"No," said Roosevelt, "you stay here and keep 
that bird treed and I will fetch them." 

Off the Colonel went like a boy, returning 
swiftly with the glasses. Then it was discovered 
that it was indeed an owl ; a pigmy owl, not much 
larger than a bluebird. Roosevelt was as 
delighted as if he had slain a grizzly. He had 
never seen a bird like this before. 

At one time Roosevelt and his companions 
camped at the Yellowstone Canyon, with the 
river four or five hundred feet below them. Moun- 
tain sheep appeared on the opposite side. The 
rules of the park forbade hunting, so the sheep 
showed no fear of them. Between the sheep and 
the riverbed there was a precipice. The question 
arose among the watchers as to whether these 
four-footed creatures could pass down this steep 
declivity to the riverbed. Roosevelt asserted that 
they could. Then he entered his tent to shave. 
When the shaving was half completed someone 
shouted that the sheep were going down. Roose- 
velt rushed out, with a towel around his throat 
and one side of his face white with lather. He 
watched the sure-footed sheep making their 



GREAT-HEART [ 197 



descent with great interest. Then he said: "I 
knew they could do it." 

While Roosevelt was on this trip in the Yel- 
lowstone he remarked; 

"I heard a Bullock's-oriole !" 

"You may have heard one," said a man familiar 
with the countr}^ "but I doubt it. Those birds 
won't come for two weeks yet." 

"I caught two bird notes which could not be 
those of any bird except an oriole," the Colonel 
insisted. 

"You may have the song twisted," said another 
member of the party. 

That evenmg at supper Roosevelt suddenly 
laid down his knife and fork, exclaiming, "Look! 
Look!" 

On a shrub before the window was a BuUock's- 
oriole. This vindication of his hearing pleased the 
Colonel immensely. 

Burroughs, after visiting the Colonel at Saga- 
more Hill in 1907, wrote that the appearance of 
a new warbler in the woods "seemed an event 
that threw the affairs of state and the Presidential 
succession into the background." He told a 
political visitor at that time that it would be im- 
possible for him to discuss politics then as he 
wanted to talk and hunt birds, and for the pur- 
pose he took his visitor with him. 



198 ] GREAT-HEART 



*'Fancy," said Burroughs, "a President of the 
United States stalking rapidly across bushy fields 
to the woods, eager as a boy and filled with the 
one idea of showing to his visitors the black- 
throated green warbler!" 

Roosevelt told Burroughs that when he was 
President he would sometimes go on bird excur- 
sions in the White House grounds. People pass- 
ing would stop and stare at him as he stood gaz- 
ing up into the trees. 

"No doubt they thought me insane," he said. 

"Yes," added Mrs. Roosevelt, who was present, 
"and as I was always with him, they no doubt 
thought that I was the nurse that had him in 
charge." 

Roosevelt's effective war on "nature fakirs" 
could not have been possible had he not known 
intimately the habits and nature of birds and ani- 
mals, and never was he found wanting. Roose- 
velt's intense interest in wild animals, it may be 
noted in passing, showed itself in his early boy- 
hood. Of the minister of his church he demanded 
to know the nature of a "zeal." 

"What is a zeal?" repeated the puzzled parson. 

"You read about him in the Psalms," said Ted. 

The minister picked up his Bible. There he 
found the answer: "For the zeal of thine house 
hath eaten me up." 



GREAT-HEART [ 109 



IN THE AFRICAN JUNGLE 

How Roosevelt should employ his energy 
when he left the Presidency had been a problem 
he had thought about for many months before 
his second term closed. 

Roosevelt was surrounded then by his famous 
**Tennis Cabinet." This was an elastic term, for 
the cabinet included not only such old Western 
friends as Ben Daniels, Seth Bullock, Luther 
Kelly — who was formerly an army scout against 
the Sioux — and Abernathy, the wolf hunter, but 
also men like Leonard Wood, James Garfield, 
Secretary of the Interior, and Robert Bacon, 
afterward Secretary of State. 

One of the chief of the many athletic diversions 
of the "Tennis Cabinet" was swimming in the 
Potomac. Roosevelt in his autobiography tells 
how one day, when the French Ambassador, 
Jusserand, was along, the members of the party, 
including the Ambassador, took off their clothes 
preliminary to swimming in the river. 

Just as they were entering the water someone 
cried : 

"Mr. Ambassador, Mr. Ambassador, you 
haven't taken off your gloves!" 

The Ambassador promptly replied: 



200 ] GREAT-HEART 



"I think I will leave them on, we might meet 
ladies!" 

Often big game hunters from abroad were 
entertained by Roosevelt and the "Tennis Cab- 
inet," and when the Colonel mentioned to this 
group his ambition to bring his hunting experi- 
ences to a grand climax in the wilds of Africa he 
received the enthusiastic encouragement that one 
would expect to come from these hunters and 
sportsmen. 

On March 23, 1909, with his son Kermit, he 
sailed from New York to Naples, thence, by way 
of Suez, to British East Africa, for a hunting 
trip in its jungles. 

The Smithsonian Institute had commissioned 
him to collect specimens, and the f aunal and floral 
trophies he brought back from this almost un- 
known country show that he fulfilled this part of 
his mission with brilliant success. 

Roosevelt was on his way to one of the wildest 
parts of the earth, yet he did not entirely cut 
himself off from the influences of culture. Always 
there were books to ease his mind when the stren- 
uous hunt was over or when the journey into the 
jungle grew monotonous. With him he took his 
famous "Pigskin library," bound in pigskin that 
they might be handled by powder-stained or oil- 



GKEAT-HEART [ 201 



stained hands. This strangely assorted list, which 
showed the wide range of Roosevelt's reading, 
included the following-named authors and works : 

"The Federahst," Carlyle's "Frederick the 
Great"; the "Song of Roland," the "Nibelungen- 
lied," the Bible and Apocrypha, Homer, Dante, 
Spenser and Milton, Shelley, Emerson, Long- 
fellow, Tennyson, Keats, Poe, Bret Harte, 
Bacon, Lowell, Euripides, Froissart, Macaulay, 
Shakespeare, Marlowe, Dickens, Thackeray, 
Cooper and Scott. "Huckleberry Finn" and 
"Tom Sawj'-er" were included for humor, and 
later were added such books as "Alice in Wonder- 
land," "Tartarin," "Don Quixote" and works of 
Darwin, Goethe and Huxley. 

The members of the Smithsonian African 
Expedition accompanying Roosevelt were Dr. 
and Colonel Edgar A. Mearns,U. S. A. (retired) 
one of the first field naturalists of the United 
States ; Edmund Heller, of Stanford University, 
a thoroughly trained naturalist ; J. Alden Loring, 
of Oswego, N. Y., a successful collector of birds 
and small animals. 

Among the white pioneers who had preceded 
Roosevelt in the African jungles were such fa- 
mous men as Livingstone and Stanley. In the 
footsteps of these self-sacrificing men came great 



202 ] GREAT-HEART 



hunters, drawn by the fascination of facing the 
lordly lion or the furious elephant or the danger- 
ous rhinoceros. Among the boldest of these was 
Roosevelt, the first great American to track these 
savage creatures into the secret places of the 
Dark Continent. 

Penetrating the jungles of East and Central 
Africa, he and his party remained for months 
almost entirely cut off from the outside world. 

In his book, "African Game Trails," published 
by Charles Scribner's Sons, the hunter-naturalist- 
author has described fascinatingly the story of 
his encounters with lions, buffaloes, rhinoceroses, 
and other dangerous animals. 

At Heatley's ranch, a place seventeen miles 
long and four miles wide, he found the haunts of 
the buffalo, a creature it had been his desire for 
a long time to shoot. Of these animals he wrote : 

"There is no doubt that under certain circum- 
stances buffalo, in addition to showing themselves 
exceedingly dangerous opponents when wounded 
by hunters, become truculent and inclined to take 
the offensive themselves. There are places in East 
Africa where, as regards at least certain herds, 
this seems to be the case ; and in Uganda the buf- 
falo have caused such loss of life and such damage 
to the native plantations that they are now ranked 



GRKAT-IIEART [ 203 



as vermin and not as game, and their killing is 
encouraged in every possible way." 

Here is his account of his shooting of his first 
buffaloes : 

"Cautiously threading our way along the edge 
of the swamp, we got within 150 yards of the 
buffalo before we were perceived. There were 
four bulls, grazing close by the edge of the 
swamp, their black bodies glistening in the early 
sun rays, their massive horns showing white, and 
the cow herons perched on their backs. They 
stared sullenly at us with outstretched heads from 
under their great frontlets of horn. 

*'The biggest of the four stood a little out from 
the other three, and at him I fired, the bullet tell- 
ing with a smack on the tough hide and going 
through the lungs. We had been afraid they 
would at once turn into the papyrus, but instead 
of this they started across our front directly for 
the open country. 

"This was a piece of huge good luck. Kermit 
put his first barrel into the second bull and I my 
second barrel into one of the others, after which 
it became impossible to say which bullet struck 
which animal, as the firing became general. They 
ran a quarter of a mile into the open, and then 
the big bull I had first shot, and which had no 



204 ] GREAT-HEART 



other bullet in him, dropped dead, while the other 
three, all of which were wounded halted beside 
him. 

"One bull dropped to the shot as if poleaxed, J 
falling straight on his back with his legs kicking, ' 
but in a moment he was up again and after the 
others. Later I found that the bullet, a full 
metal patch, had struck him in the head, but did 
not penetrate the brain, and merely stunned him 
for a moment. 

"All the time we kept running diagonally to 
their line of flight. They were all three badly 
wounded, and when they reached the tall, rank 
grass, high as a man's head, which fringed the 
papyrus swamp, the two foremost lay down, 
while the hindmost turned, and, with nose out- 
stretched, began to come toward us. He was badly 
crippled, however, and with a soft-nosed bullet 
from my heavy Holland I knocked him down, 
this time for good. The other two rose and though 
each was again hit they reached the swamp, one 
of them to our right, the other to the left, where 
the papyrus came out in a point." 

Roosevelt the hunter had faced many danger- 
ous situations in his adventures in the wilds, but 
his first encounter with an elephant brought him 
closer to death than he had ever been. It was 



GREAT-HEART [ 205 



his comrade, F. C. Selous, an able and experi- 
enced African hunter, who saved the American 
on this occasion. 

A shot from Roosevelt's party had badly 
wounded a great lion. It had finally taken refuge 
in a dense thicket. Selous advised the party that 
it would be dangerous to come to close quarters 
with it. Roosevelt excited by the chase, plunged 
into the thicket in pursuit of the beast. 

The party had seen no elephants and were 
unaware that any were in their vicinity. Selous, 
who, with Kermit, had followed Roosevelt, saw 
the Colonel lift his gun hurriedly to his shoulder. 
He glanced in the same direction and caught sight 
of a herd of elephants led by an enormous tusker. 
This animal was less than two hundred feet away. 

Selous shouted: "For the life of you, don't 
shoot! A bullet will bring a charge of the herd 
and we may be trampled to death. Follow me !" 

Roosevelt reluctantly lowered his rifle. Selous 
led the Colonel and Kermit to a safe spot and 
bade them climb a tree. From this position Selous 
showed his companions how to aim. Roosevelt 
raised his Winchester and sent a half-dozen bul- 
lets into the leader of the herd. 

With a scream of pain, the elephant charged, 
but when close to the tree he fell with a tremen- 



206 ] GREAT-HEART 



dous crash. He had received his death woundv 
The rest of the herd fled, pursued by Kermit's 
bullets. 

Many a big game hunter has been killed by the 
swirling trunk or the trampling feet of a wounded 
elephant. If the Colonel had fired from the posi- 
tion from which Selous rescued him he would un- 
doubtedly have been crushed to death when the 
brute charged. 

Roosevelt's exploits in Africa aroused the 
intense admiration of the natives, and as a com- 
pliment to his shooting ability they named him 
"Bwana Tumbo," the Great Hunter. 

Carl Akeley, head of the elephant hunting 
expedition in Africa for the American Museum 
of Natural History, met the Roosevelt expedi- 
tion in Africa and spent several days hunting 
with the Colonel. 

Mr. Akeley found that while the Colonel took 
a huge interest in the hunt for big game, he was 
yet so much of a naturalist that he showed a keen 
interest in even the most insignificant of wild 
creatures. A small rodent had been discovered 
on the North American Continent. The discov- 
ery was of small moment. Few men remembered 
it, yet the Colonel was found to know all about it. 
Akeley says: 



GREAT- HEART [ 207 



"I found Colonel Roosevelt one of the most 
refreshing and delightful companions I ever had 
the pleasure of knowing. He was as ideal and 
keen a sportsman as ever lived. The least of his 
pleasure was in the killing of animals. He found 
infinite joy in studying wild animal life in its 
native haunts. His greatest pleasures lay in 
seeing and learning, thereby proving himself an 
ideal naturalist." 



XVI 

"The River of Doubt" 

AT Gondokoro, Uganda, Roosevelt ended his 
XjL African hunts. He came through his many 
perilous situations unharmed. Kermit was also 
in the best of health. The latter was praised by 
Scout Cunninghame as one of the best shots and 
most daring hunters he had ever seen. 

The Colonel on his journey back to civilization, 
visited first the Congo Free State, where the Bel- 
gian officers in charge of that colony gave him a 
warm welcome. 

The journey was then continued by way of the 
Nile to Khartum, where the first newspaper men 
Roosevelt had seen for months raced up the Nile 
to greet him. Here Mrs. Roosevelt and her 
daughter met Kermit and him, and there was an 
affectionate family reunion. The party then 
traveled through Egypt. 

In a speech at Cairo the Colonel referred jok- I 
ingly to Wall Street's attitude toward him by 
saying that when he left America to hunt in 
Africa "Wall Street expected every lion to do 
its duty." 

From Alexandria the Colonel took a steamer 
for Italy and, on landing in Naples, found a 

[208] 




t k}^ 



GREAT-HEART [ 209 



mountain of letters and cablegrams from America 
awaiting him. After a tour of Austria Roosevelt 
went to France. Ambassador Jusserand was the 
first to greet him. In an address in Paris 
Roosevelt spoke these prophetic words: 

"Made to understand and love each other, our 
two countries have been friends from the begin- 
ning, and no doubt will always remain friends in 
the future. Every civilized man who comes to 
France learns something, because France is the 
cradle of modern civilization." 

The Colonel then visited Belgium, Holland — 
the home of his ancestors — Denmark, Norway, 
Sweden, Germany and England. 

Roosevelt arrived in London while Britain was 
mourning the death of King Edward. He took 
part in the great ceremonial funeral procession, 
made a sensational speech in regard to England's 
rule in Egypt, became the guest of Sir Edward 
Grey, the Biitish Foreign Secretary, and left 
England for home with this remark: 

"My day in New Forest with Sir Edward 
Grey was the crowning experience of the whole 
three months." 

His landing in Manhattan was marked by one 
of the greatest ovations an American citizen had 
ever received in New York City. 

TR15 



210 ] GREAT- HEART 



THE FATEFUL JOURNEY THROUGH BRAZIL 

One day in 1908, when Roosevelt's Presi- 
dential term was drawing to a close, Father 
Zahm, a priest, called on him. The priest had just 
returned from a trip across the Andes and down 
the Amazon. He proposed that when Roosevelt 
left the Presidency he should take a trip with 
him into the interior of South America. 

Roosevelt's African trip was then uppermost 
in his mind, so the subject was dropped. Five 
years later, however, Roosevelt accepted invi- 
tations from Argentina and Brazil to address 
certain societies. It occurred to him then that 
after making this tour he could come north 
through the middle of the continent into the valley 
of the Amazon. His plans for the trip were soon 
under way. Frank Chapman, curator of the 
American Museum of Natural History, New 
York, gladly appointed the naturalists George 
K. Cherrie and Leo E. Miller to accompany the 
party. Both were veterans of th6 tropical Ameri- 
can forests. Father Zahm also agreed to go. 
Kermit Roosevelt joined the party. 

On December 9 of the same year, as the party 
left Asuncion to ascend the Paraguay, Colonel 
Rondo and other Brazilians joined the expedi- 



I 



GREAT-HEART [ 211 



tion as representatives of the Brazilian govern- 
ment. 

In the latter part of the next February the 
party started their long descent of the Duvida — 
"The River of Doubt." Colonel Roosevelt 
describes this voyage interestingly in his book 
"Through the Brazihan Wilderness." Many 
danofers confronted them. The descent of the 
rapids was perilous to men and boats. They were 
in danger of being slain through encounters with 
Indians. They faced the necessity of long, wear- 
ing portages or contact with impassable swamps. 
Fever and dysentery were ills that haunted that 
region. Starvation, caused by the loss of supplies, 
was not beyond the bounds of possibility. 

On they went, however, enduring the dangers 
and hardships they encountered like the true 
explorers they were. They had to wade through 
water for days at a time. Their shoes were never 
dry. Insect bites became festering wounds in their 
bodies. Poisonous ants, biting flies, ticks, wasps 
and bees never ceased to torment them. 

Under these circumstances the temper of the 
men was sorely tried. At last came a tragedy. 
Julio, one of their attendants, a powerful fellow 
but a rogue, shot Paishon, a good-natured negro 
sergeant. The murderer escaped into the wilder- 
ness and was never found. 



212 ] GREAT-HEART 



At last, exhausted and almost broken by their 
terrible hardships, they reached their destination. 
They had put on the map a river of some 1,500 
kilometers' length from its highest source to its 
confluence with the Amazon. 

Some of his statements on the subject of his 
explorations and discoveries were twisted and 
ridiculed by the press. The fact remains that he 
rendered a great service to geographers by loca- 
ting the mouth of this river exactly. Other 
explorers had discovered its source but they pos- 
sessed neither the courage nor endurance to fol- 
low it to its mouth. It was a real River of Doubt, 
because nobody knew where it led until Colonel 
Roosevelt cleared away the mystery. 

Colonel Rondo, chief of the Brazilian mission 
which had accompanied the Colonel's party, told 
later how the Colonel's leg had become infected. 
While the party was shooting the rapids in the 
River of Doubt, he said, the boat came near being 
capsized, and in trying to save it Colonel Roose- 
velt received a wound in the leg Poison spread 
from this to the blood and impeded the Colonel's 
walking. 

When he returned to New York, highly hon- 
ored by the Brazilian government and praised 
for his achievements by explorers who knew the 



GREAT-HEART [213 



greatness of his undertaking, he was a sick man. 
Fever burned within him. His constitution was 
undermined. He admitted now that he had 
waited too long to undertake the hardest and 
most perilous task of his life. 

These facts lead inevitably to the conclusion 
that the trip to South America marked the begin- 
ning of the end for the Colonel. Friends and phy- 
sicians point to the fact that from that time began 
the series of maladies that attacked him recur- 
rently until his death. Viewing the terrible hard- 
ships Roosevelt experienced on this journey of 
exploration it is not going wide of the mark to 
say that he laid on the altar of science a score of 
what would have been his most fruitful years. 



XVII 

Roosevelf s Part 
in the World War 

WHEN America entered the world war 
Theodore Roosevelt stood among the first 
of those who volunteered their services. He had 
dealt with the grasping Prussian spirit in the 
Venezuelan incident in 1902, and made the sword- 
clanking junkers back down. He was fervently 
anxious to help do it again. 

The Colonel announced that he had asked the 
War Department for permission to raise a body 
of troops. "In such event, I and my four sons 
will go," he said, and added: "I don't want to 
be put in the position of saying to my fellow 
countrymen, 'Go to war.' I want to be in the 
position of saying: 'Come to the war; I am going 
with you.' " 

Then, after a period of suspense in which the 
Colonel was a veritable Paul Revere in urging 
the nation to prepare, war actually came. On this 
momentous day the former President of the 
United States received the news in about the 
same spirit that Bill Jones and Henry Brown 
and the rest of his Oyster Bay neighbors greeted 

[214] 



(J UE AT- HE ART [215 



it. Colonel Roosevelt forgot that he had been 
twice President of the United States. He remem- 
bered only that America wanted men. 

The Colonel felt himself to be fully equipped. 
Aside from the fact that he was a retired Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the United States Army, in 
the Santiago campaign he had served in the first 
fight as commander, had earned promotion to the 
rank of colonel in his regiment and had ended the 
campaign in command of the brigade. 

The Colonel followed up his previous applica- 
tion to the Secretary of War, with the telegram 
from which these words are quoted : 

"To the Secretary of War, Washington, D. C. 

"In view of the fact that Germany is now actu- 
ally engaged in war with us, I again earnestly 
ask permission to raise a division for immediate 
service at the front. My purpose would be, after 
some six weeks' preliminary training here, to take 
it direct to France for intensive training, so that 
it could be sent to the front in the shortest possible 
time to whatever point was desired. I should, of 
course, ask no favors of any kind, except that 
the division be put in the fighting line at the 
earliest possible moment. 

"Theodore Roosevelt.'' 



216 ] GREAT- HEART 



Meanwhile, while Colonel Roosevelt waited 
with the ardor of a boy the answer to this 
appeal, applications for military service abroad 
under him were pouring in from all sections 
of the country. News of his desire to fight 
in France had spread like wildfire, and every man 
who had served with the Colonel at Santiago, as 
well as every man who wished that he had served 
with him, wired, wrote and telephoned his appli- 
cation to serve now. Authors, artists, engineers, 
cowboys, clerks, lawyers, ministers, wanted to go 
to France with "Teddy." "Batthng" Nelson and 
"Kid" McCoy were among the applicants. North 
Carolina offered to send a company. This evi- 
dence of the loyalty of the red-blooded men who 
had fought his civic and military battles with him 
touched the Colonel deeply and very naturally 
increased the anxiety with which he awaited the 
answer from the War Department. 

Interesting and enthusiastic was this comment 
of Colonel Henry Watterson, the famous editor 
of "The Louisville Courier- Journal" : 

"The proposal of Theodore Roosevelt to enlist 
in the world's army of freedom and to go to one 
of the fronts in Europe leading a body of Ameri- 
can soldiers may not be whistled lightly down 
the wind as a man who has a positive genius for 



GREAT- HEART [21' 



the spectacular. It should be considered very 
seriously. Men are reached equally through their 
imagination and their patriotism, and except for 
the sympathetic and emotional in man there 
would be no armies. The appearance of an ex- 
President of the United States carrying the Star- 
Spangled Banner over a body of American sol- 
diers to the battlefront would glorify us as will 
nothing else. It will electrify the world." 

After further correspondence by letter and 
wire, through which the Colonel pleaded with all 
the fervor of his patriotism and all the strength 
of his convictions that he be allowed to muster for 
service the older men of the country, who would 
not otherwise be called, the Secretary of War 
forwarded him, with assurances of appreciation 
of the Colonel's patriotic spirit, the recommen- 
dation of the War College Division of the Gen- 
eral Staff to the effect that no American troops 
be employed in active service in any European 
theatre until after an adequate period of train- 
ing and that only regular officers be put in com- 
mand of them. 

Colonel Roosevelt's unsuccessful effort to go 
to France with his proposed volunteer division 
was undoubtedly the keenest disappointment of 
his life. President Wilson, in his statement 



218 ] GREAT-HEART 



declining the offer of the Roosevelt division, did 
not fail to pay tribute to the patriotism and cour- 
age of the great volunteer. 

The President said in part: 

"I shall not avail myself, at any rate at the 
present stage of the w^ar, of the authority con- 
ferred by the act to organize volunteer divisions. 
I imderstand that this section was added with a 
view to providing an independent military com- 
mand for Mr. Roosevelt and giving the military 
authorities an opportunity to use his fine vigor 
and enthusiasm in recruiting." 

Remarking further that it would be "very 
agreeable" to him to confer this honor on the ex- 
President, the President added that "to do so 
would seriously interfere with the carrying out 
of the chief and most important purpose con- 
templated by this legislation, the prompt creation 
and early use of an effective army, and would 
contribute practically nothing to the effective 
strength of the armies now engaged against 
Germany." 



GREAT- HEART [219 



ROOSEVELT'S FIGHTING SONS 

"Colonel, one of these days those hoys of yours 
will he putting the name Roosevelt on the map!" 

Peter Dunne's remark to Roosevelt, 
quoted in the "Metropolitan" 

But although the door of active personal ser- 
vice was thus shut to him, there remained open 
four wide avenues through which the war could 
come to him and through which he could pour in 
the greatest measure the inspiration of his ideals 
— his four sons: Theodore, Jr., Kermit, Archie 
and Quentin. 

Just as the sons of Bill Jones and Henry 
Brown were flaming with a desire to get to the 
firing line, so these four sons of the Colonel 
became dominated with a desire to do their part 
to save the world from reverting to the barbaric 
ages and incidentally to prove that they were 
worthy sons of the man who had led his troops 
in the battle of San Juan Hill. 

In Germany the Kaiser's six sons, though hold- 
ing high commands, were so protected that the 
royal family was about the only family in all 
Germany that had escaped wounds. Debauches, 
hunting trips and similar revelries filled the time 



220 ] GREAT-HEART 



of these princelings. The contrast between them 
and the four sons of the ex-President of the 
United States was indeed marked. 

Sword-ratthng and gold braid were foreign to 
the nature of this new world breed, and yet, along 
with millions of other young Americans, when 
the time came they proved their fighting qualities 
in a way that put outworn royalty to shame. 

Quentin, the youngest, was a sophomore when 
America entered the war. Theodore, Jr., Archi- 
bald and Kermit were all in business, married and 
had children. Each entered at once the officers' 
training camp at Plattsburg, seeking no promo- 
tion or honors that did not come through their 
own merits. 

Theodore, Jr., after his Plattsburg training, 
received from President Wilson his commission 
in the Officers' Reserve Corps. He earned his 
promotion to the rank of major of infantry and 
left Plattsburg with confidential orders to sail to 
France. Here he was transferred to the 26th 
Regiment of the line; was gassed at Cantigny, 
and later wounded. He received a citation for 
bravery. After further service with the Army of 
Occupation, he returned to America with the 
rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, 

Archie, after the same course of training, left 



GREAT-HEART [221 



Plattsburg with the rank of lieutenant under con- 
fidential orders to proceed to General Pershing's 
headquarters in France. He was later transferred 
to the 26th Regiment of the line, and while lead- 
ing his men in an attack was wounded by a bullet 
and lay for fourteen hours unattended in No 
Man's Land. For his gallantry he was later 
recommended by General Pershing for promo- 
tion to the rank of captain. He received the 
French War Cross while lying on an operating 
table. He came back to Sagamore Hill to re- 
cover from his wounds, and he was the only one 
of the Colonel's sons who was with him when 
he died. 

Kermit was appointed a captain of the United 
States National Army and left Plattsburg to 
accept a position in the British army, where, after 
serving as a captain and receiving the British 
Military Cross, he was transferred, in accordance 
with his wishes, to the army in France. 

Then there was Quentin — the youngest — who 
derived his name from an ancestor who left 
France 225 years ago. Quentin suffered from a 
defect of vision, which led to his rejection in the 
first officers' training camp. He was wild to get 
to the front; and his next thought was to become 
an airman. It was natural that the father, who 



222 ] GREAT-HEART 



had ridden bucking broncos, should be pleased to 
see in his youngest a desire to gain mastery over 
a bucking airplane. And it was also very natural 
that the father should want to try the aerial steed 
for himself. Hence it was that early one morn- 
ing the car of the Colonel, driven by Charley Lee, 
his colored chauffeur, shot down Sagamore Hill 
to the aviation camp at Mineola, Long Island, j 

The Colonel's arrival had been anticipated, for 
a group of army officers left a nearby hangar and 
strode forward to greet him. For a moment the 
Colonel was a youth again, keenly interested in 
the mechanics of the car and as eager as Quentin 
to explore the virgin reaches of space. With non- 
chalance, yet with a heart that no doubt thumped 
with excitement, the Colonel climbed into the 
airplane and helped the pilot to buckle him in. 
The next moment the former President of the 
United States had soared away on his first air 
flight. After a forty minutes' ride over and about 
Long Island Sound, in which all of the eccen- 
tricities of aerial travel were demonstrated, the 
Colonel was volplaned to the ground. Every 
other experience in the realm of sportsmanship 
had been his — and now the climactic experience 
had been accomplished. | 

Having met his own boy Quentin on his own 



GKEAT-HEART [ 223 



ground, and having, as a father, learned for him- 
self just what his son was proposing to do, he 
went back to that interview with Quentin, which 
resulted in his giving his consent to his enroll- 
ment in the most dangerous branch of the service. 
Quentin was on the verge of applying for enlist- 
ment in the Canadian Flying Corps when it was 
announced that the War Department had accep- 
ted him in the U. S. Aviation Section. He went 
with the first flying unit to France in July, 1917, 
reaching France a few weeks after Archie and 
Theodore, Jr. 

One day, just after his brothers, Theodore and 
Archie, had gone to France, Colonel Roosevelt 
was entertaining about a thousand visitors at a 
patriotic rally at Sagamore Hill. An army air- 
plane soared up the bay. The airman performed 
various maneuvers that thrilled the throng but 
the father did not know till days afterward that 
the daring aviator was Quentin. 

It was one of the ironies of life that not long 
after this episode there came an overseas cable to 
Colonel Roosevelt which brought the war home 
to him in a way that can only be realized by the 
man who has lost a son. 

A newspaper man stationed at Oyster Bay has 
described how the Colonel and Mrs. Roosevelt 
bore the news of their loss. 



224 ] GREAT-HEART 



At 7:30 on the following morning the news- 
paper man at Oyster Bay rang the bell at Saga- 
more Hill. The Colonel came to the door. There 
was no need to speak. 

The two walked to the old-fashioned veranda 
of the Roosevelt house. And there, with the 
early morning breezes sweeping from the Sound, 
the Colonel heard the positive confirmation of the 
tragedy of the trenches — that the previous night's 
cablegrams had been too cruelly verified. 

For a long space the Colonel walked in silence, 
his brow furrowed. Then, turning to his com- 
panion, he said: 

"But — Mrs. Roosevelt! How am I going to 
break it to her?" 

It was of his wife and not of himself that the 
Colonel thought and pondered. 

Abruptly he turned back to the house — to face 
the hardest task of his life. For the first time 
death had entered the intimate Roosevelt family 
circle. 

A few hours later the newspaper man saw the 
Colonel again. With him was Mrs. Roosevelt, 
with eyes bright and voice steady. Yet it was 
plain that she had been told. 

Thus, with telegrams and cablegrams of sym- 
pathy flooding the little Oyster Bay office by 




ROOSEVELT S SERVICE STARS 



i 



GREAT- HEART [225 



thousands, the father and mother of the boy 
who had given his hfe above the lines — received 
the news that their youngest born would never 
return. 

The only public statement Colonel Roosevelt 
made concerning Quentin's death was in every 
way typical of the man: 

"Quentin's mother and I are very glad that he 
got to the front and had a chance to render some 
service to his country and show the stuff that 
was in him before his fate befell him." 

Quentin lies buried in France. There his body 
will remain. No formal treaty our country could 
make with France would be as eloquent of the 
good will that exists and will continue to exist 
between these two great republics as the fact 
that in French soil lie the bodies of Americans 
who fought and died in the common cause of 
humanity. Thus Quentin's father thought; thus 
the world thinks. The following letter from 
Colonel Roosevelt to General March, while re- 
specting the wishes of those parents who want 
the bodies of their boys brought home, carried a 
message of comfort and agreement to those 
parents who desired their dead soldier sons to 
remain in the resting places prepared for them 
near the field of battle by their comrades: 

TR16 



226 ] GREAT-HEART 



My Dear General March: 

The inclosed clipping states that all the Ameri- 
can dead will be taken home after the war, ac- 
cording to orders received by the army chaplains. 
I do not know whom to write to in the matter, 
so I merely ask that you turn this over to whom- 
ever has charge of it. 

Mrs. Roosevelt and I wish to enter a most 
respectful but most emphatic protest against the 
proposed course so far as our son Quentin is 
concerned. We have always believed that 

Where the tree falls, 
There let it lie. 

We know that many good persons feel entirely 
different, but to us it is painful and harrowing 
long after death to move the poor body from 
which the soul has fled. We greatly prefer that 
Quentin shall continue to lie on the spot where 
he fell in battle and where the f oemen buried him. 

After the war is over Mrs. Roosevelt and I 
intend to visit the grave and then to have a small 
stone put up saying it is put up by us, but not 
disturbing what has already been erected to his 
memory by his friends and American comrades 
in arms. 

With apologies for troubling you. 

Very faithfully yours, 

Theodore Roosevelt. 



GREAT- HEART [ 227 



/ 



It seems strange that up to the very time of 
America's participation in the war there should 
be people in this country who did not realize the 
self-sacrificing work for the national cause done 
by the Colonel, yet such was true. 

At a mass meeting in Madison Square Garden 
Roosevelt was talking about the part the United 
States should take in the war, when a man 
shouted : 

"\Vliy aren't you over there yourself?" 

Some men cried, "Put him out!" But Roose- 
velt raised his hand for silence and said, "No, 
don't put him out. Let him stay. I want to 
answer him." 

When the audience was still he went on: 

"I couldn't go myself, but I did send my four 
sons, every one of whose lives is a thousand times 
dearer to me than my own. There, you creature, 
that is my answer to any man who dares to ask 
an American father why he isn't engaged in 
this war." 

The scorching anger of the Colonel and the 
scorn of the audience made the heckler slink away 
with a rebuke he will always remember. 



228 ] GREAT- HEART 



DEMOCRACY IN THE ARMY 

Long before the United States entered the 
war Roosevelt with his friend, Major-General 
Wood, vigorously advocated a policy of national 
preparedness, urging universal military training 
for the nation's youth. In explanation of his 
desire to see universal military service prevail 
the Colonel said: 

"I want to see Mrs. Vanderbilt's son and Mrs. 
Astor's son, with Pat and Jim of Telegraph HiD, 
sleeping under the same dog tent and eating 
the same food. I want to see the officers selected 
from among them on the strict basis of merit, 
without regard to anything else. Then we will 
have a democratic system." 

Roosevelt took a great deal of pride in the 
five-star service button he wore. In a conver- 
sation with newspaper men some months after 
his boys had gone abroad, he told them that he 
had received news that Theodore had been in 
action and a bullet had struck his trench helmet 
and glanced off. Theodore wrote home, his father 
said, that he regretted he had not been wounded, 
just for the experience. Later, Theodore was to 
receive his full share of such experiences. 

At the time of this conversation public an- 




COLONEL ROOSEVELT AT SAGAMORE HILL 



i 



GREAT-HEART [ 229 



nouncement had just been made that "Archie" 
had been promoted in rank from second lieu- 
tenant to captain. Roosevelt told his hearers that 
"Archie" had led a raiding party out into No 
Man's Land at night and that the promotion had 
been won by gallantry under fire during this raid. 

The Colonel said further that Kermit, with the 
Anglo-Indian forces in Mesopotamia, as the 
leader of "a troop of Whirling Dervishes," In- 
dian cavalry, had also been in action. 

Later the Colonel's pride in his family's war 
record was to extend to include the women of 
his family. Mrs. Roosevelt, in the heart-breaking 
trials she passed through, had proven herself a 
true heroine. Her daughters and daughters-in- 
law proved in many ways their devotion to their 
country's cause. Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., 
did especially effective work. 

She was the first American woman sent abroad 
for war service by the Y. M. C. A. She arrived 
in Paris a few weeks after Pershing. There she 
conducted a French class for Americans, with 
ambulance drivers for pupils. Then she worked 
in the first canteen in Paris, and was in charge 
of all the women's work in establisliing the first 
American officers' hotel. 

When she had been in Paris six months the 



230 ] GREAT-HEART 



army created "leave areas" for the American 
soldiers. These areas were put under the control 
of the Y. M. C. A., whose officials gave Mrs. 
Roosevelt charge of the women's part of the 
work. 



f^^- 






Requiem 

'Under the wide and starry sky 
Dig the grave and let me lie. 
Glad did I live and gladly die 
And I laid me down with a will. 

This be the verse you grave for me: 
Here he lies where he longed to be; 
Home is the sailor, home from the sea, 
And the hunter home from the hill." 

— Robert Louis Stevenson, 



XVIII 

"Great-Heart" 

SINCE Roosevelt's death there have been 
many suggestions made for a memorial to 
him. Many of the projects are highly commend- 
able and w^ell worthy of popular support, yet the 
fact remains that Roosevelt's own works will 
bring coming generations their best remembrance 
of him. 

Fortunately for posterity, this great American 
was a faithful recorder of his own works, and 
libraries and book stores are full of his writings 
or those of authorized biographers that give us 
a full range of his extraordinarily active life. 
Fortunately, too, for the world is the fact that 
Roosevelt recognized the film as another effective 
medium for bringing him in touch with the 
people, and authorized before his death the rep- 
resentation of his life and work in motion pictures. 

The deep and permanent impression Roosevelt 
made on the people of his time — which will ex- 
tend far into the future to influence coming gen- 
erations of Americans, is due not only to his 
personal acts but also to his literary work. As 
an author and as an editor, the Colonel contrib- 
uted historical writings and entertaining narra- 

[233] 



234 ] GREAT-HEART 



tives to the literature of our country that earned 
him brilliant distinction and made his name and 
works familiar to all who read. His work as a 
historian led to his election in 1912 to the Presi- 
dency of the American Historical Association, 
and also to his admission into the American 
Academy of Arts and Letters. Roosevelt served 
"The Outlook" as contributing editor from 1909 
to 1914 and then joined the staff of the "Metro- 
politan Magazine," remaining on its staff as con- 
tributing editor until his death. His contributions 
to these magazines on contemporary subjects 
were always interesting, forceful and construc- 
tive, and exercised a profound influence on the 
life and development of the nation. 

That Roosevelt was born to be an author as ^ 
well as a statesman is proven by the fact that no 
matter how busy he was he alwaj'^s found time 
to write. In college and while he was reading law 
in his uncle's office, he found time to write "The 
Naval War of 1812," a standard work on the 
subject. He wrote his "Life of Thomas Hart 
Benton" and his "Hunting Trips of a Ranch- 
man" while he was pursuing his arduous career 
as a rancher. Wlien his duties as Civil Service 
Commissioner at Washington were pressing 
upon him he yet found time to write several 



GREAT-HEART [ 235 



books on hunting, as well as part of his splendid 
work "The Winning of the West." Thus it was 
throughout his career. Greater and greater grew 
the demands upon his time, yet the number of 
volumes to his credit mounted steadily. 

Since his cattle-raising venture had failed, and 
since he knew the income from any public posi- 
tions he should hold would be inadequate to the 
expenses of the office and generally uncertain, 
he determined that his pen should support him. 
The fact that, when he died, his income from his 
wi'itings was about one hundred thousand dollars 
a year shows how well he kept his resolution. 

Mr. J. H. Whigham, publisher of the "Metro- 
politan Magazine," thus interestingly describes 
the way in which Roosevelt formed and kept his 
literary decisions: 

"His first coming to the 'Metropolitan' was in 
keeping with all the Colonel said and did. The 
thing that worried him most in making a connec- 
tion was whether he could faithfully carry out 
his part of the bargain. I had known Roosevelt 
first in Cuba when I lived for some weeks with 
the Rough Riders and shared the precarious but 
precious potatoes of the Colonel's own mess. It 
didn't require much perspicacity to see that he 
was the sort of leader to tie to and cherish. Nat- 



236 ] GREAT- HEART 



urally, therefore, when the 'Metropolitan Maga- 
zine' came into my control I looked around for 
Roosevelt. He was contributing editor of 'The 
Outlook' then, and there is no need to say that 
he couldn't be weaned away from his allegiance 
to the Abbotts, for whom he always had the 
greatest affection. I managed, however, to get 
him interested in what we were trying to do with 
the 'Metropolitan,' and he promised to let me 
know if he ever changed his plans. 

"When the war broke out I came back from 
Europe to find that the Colonel's time with 'The 
Outlook' was up. Before I could see him, he had 
begun to publish some syndicated newspaper 
articles in which he denounced the invasion of 
Belgium. Hurrying over to his office, which 
was then in Forty-second Street, I caught him on 
the verge of closing a year's arrangement with 
the syndicate. I reminded him of my prior claim 
which he freely granted. He couldn't see, how- 
ever, how he could deliver full value to a monthly 
magazine. The syndicate could publish two or 
three times a month and so get back their money. 
I told him that was our affair. We wouldn't 
worry about not getting our money's worth. But 
the Colonel said that he couldn't avoid worrying. 
He didn't like being in the position of not being 



GREAT-HEART [ 237 



able totieliver full value. He had never been in 
that pos'tion before, and he didn't propose to be 
there now. I gave him excellent reasons, as I 
thought, why he would be worth as much to us 
as to any newspaper syndicate, and he was nearly 
convinced but not quite. I left him feeling pretty 
sure that he would decide against us. But I was 
determined not to lose him. After wracking my 
brains for two or three hours for a new argument 
I suddenly remembered that I had mentioned no 
period for the proposed association. Suppose 
that I offered him a three years' contract instead 
of one, would not that give us a greater and more 
exclusive value and so satisfy the Colonel that 
both parties would profit by the agreement? It 
was late at night and I had difficulty in getting 
the number of his private wire at Oyster Bay. 
Nevertheless I finally brought him to the tele- 
phone and made my new proposal. He laughed ; 
and said, 'You seem to want me pretty badly. 
I'm sure I can't think why. It's true your new 
offer puts a new complexion on the matter. Come 
out and see me tomorrow at nine. I have to 
decide this business by ten in the morning.' 

"I went, and it was decided in our favor. We 
never regretted it and I'm thankful to say the 
Colonel never regretted it either." 



238 ] GREAT-HEART 



The Colonel at the time of his death was also 
a regular contributor to the "Kansas City Star." 

ROOSEVELT AT HOME 

So far as his private life is concerned, Roose- 
velt will be recorded in history as being thor- 
oughly representative of that love of family, 
domestic simplicity, and devotion to the duties 
of married life, which go to make a great race. 
These traits were of course largely influenced by 
Mrs. Roosevelt herself. She exercised a restrain- 
ing power upon his impulsiveness. Before enter- 
ing on any enterprise, he always asked himself, 
"What will she think of it?" 

She was noted for her graceful mastery of 
every social situation, and as Mistress of the 
White House, she cultivated and preserved those 
traditions of hospitality that belong to that high 
place. 

Roosevelt was a devout member of the Dutch 
Reformed Church. A friend thus describes the 
Colonel's attendance at a little church of his faith 
in Washington: "He came in quietly, unat- 
tended, went well up front, bowed a moment in 
prayer and was ready for the service. The ser- 
mon was a good plain gospel sermon and he 
seemed to enjoy it. His singing and responses 



GREAT-HEART [ 239 



to the Scripture readings were like his talks to 
Congress — clear and energetic, as if he didn't 
care who heard him as long as he knew he was 
right. Throughout the sermon he gave the most 
earnest attention. He impressed one as being a 
man who believed in exercising the same sincerity 
in religious matters as in any others, and I got a 
new light on his now famous 'square deal' prin- 
ciples." 

After the service Roosevelt said: 

"The services this morning were enjoyable. 
The sermon was good and I agreed with him in 
the points he made that the home is the chief 
foundation stone of the republic and the hope 
of the church. The 'Holy, Holy, Lord God Al- 
mighty' is one of the grandest of hymns; after 
a week spent on perplexing problems and in 
heated contests it does so rest my soul to come 
into the house of the Lord and worship and to 
sing, and mean it, the 'Holy, Holy, Lord God 
Almighty,' and to know that He is my Father, 
and He takes me up into His life and plans, and 
to commune personally with Christ who died for 
me. I am sure I get a wisdom not my o\vn and 
a superhuman strength in fighting the moral 
evils I am called to confront." 

A man with this belief can pass from this 



240 ] GREAT-HEART 



world unafraid and eager for the adventures of 
the higher world beyond him. Thus went the 
Colonel. Warrior though he was his end was 
peaceful; he approached his grave: 

''Like one tvJio wraps the drapery of his couch 
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams/* 

The historian will draw many great lessons 
from the life of Roosevelt. His devotion to public 
duty, his advocacy of the square deal, his hundred 
per cent. Americanism, his superhuman activity 
in many fields, will be outstanding features of 
every biography. 

Perhaps, however, the following extract from 
a memorial tribute made by Dr. Newell Dwight 
Hillis sums up his characteristics as well as 
anything that can be said in a few words: 

HOPE FOR RICH MEN'S SONS 

"One of the logical inferences from the suc- 
cessful career of Roosevelt," said Dr. Hillis, 
"is that even the richest man's son can succeed 
in this republic. In the republic, for some strange 
reason, a prejudice has grown up in favor of the 
poor boy and against the son of the palace and 
the private car. Little by little, extreme wealth 
has become a handicap, and the child of the 



GREAT-HEART [ 241 



millionaire is out of the race before he enters it. 
It is a real obstacle for a man who aspires to 
political office and honor to fall heir to enormous 
wealth. The favorites of fortune are those who 
drive the mule along the canal path or in their 
teens support a widowed mother, or come from 
a log cabin to the great city. 

"Now and then, however, there is a youth who 
uses his wealth instead of abusing it, Mr. Roose- 
velt's entire career is an incentive to rich men's 
sons. Bom in a great house; a graduate of 
Harvard — rich man's college; traveled abroad; 
a Civil Service Commissioner with George 
Wilham Curtis, an intellectual aristocrat; Police 
Commissioner of New York; a cattle man on 
the plains of Montana; leader of the Rough 
Riders in Cuba; Governor of New York; Vice- 
President and President of the United States — 
all this represents a long and brilliant career. 
But Lincoln did not work harder; Garfield was 
not more industrious ; McKinley was not as close 
a student ; Henry Clay was not more democratic ; 
and among Mr. Roosevelt's closest friends were 
untaught men, illiterate ranchers, who were full 
of latent intellect and sound sense. His capacity 
for friendship was one of the ex-President's most 
striking characteristics. By his patience, his 



242 ] GREAT-HEART 



industry, his hunger for knowledge, his mingling 
with all sorts and conditions of men, his incessant 
travel, Mr. Roosevelt overcame every handicap 
imposed by wealth and became a hero to the rich 
and poor, the cultivated and the untaught, and 
a guide and friend and standard for all classes, 
in all countries." 



On January 8, 1919, Theodore Roosevelt was 
buried on the hillside of the Oyster Bay Ceme- 
tery, near the blue waters of the Sound he loved 
so dearly and close to the trees and hills he had 
roamed among from boyhood. On his grave was 
dropped a wreath from an aviator who had been 
a friend of "Quentin, the eagle" — the hero son 
who had died in France. 

Two months later, "Bill" Sewall came down 
from the Maine woods to visit the resting place 
of the man who had been his companion on many 
a journey into the wilderness. "It's just the 
kind of place Theodore would like to be buried !" 
he said. 

THE END. 








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